[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 25 (Tuesday, February 7, 2023)]
[Senate]
[Pages S256-S257]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        TRIBUTE TO WILLIE FRITZ

 Mr. MARSHALL. Mr. President, I rise today to honor, in my 
opinion, the Kansan of the year, Willie Fritz. Fritz is currently the 
head football coach at Tulane University in New Orleans, which saw 
unprecedented success this year, culminating in a thrilling victory 
over the University of Southern California in the Cotton Bowl Classic.
  To give some background on Coach Fritz, he graduated from Shawnee 
Mission Northwest High School in 1978 and went on to be a dual sport 
athlete in basketball and football at Pittsburg State University for 4 
years, both fantastic Kansas institutions. After multiple assistant 
coaching roles at various colleges--including Pittsburg State--Coach 
Fritz landed his first head coaching job at Central Missouri in 1997 
and began his run of success as a head coach. He would stay at Central 
Missouri for 12 years and then went to coach at Sam Houston State and 
Georgia Southern before arriving at Tulane in 2016.
  During his time at Tulane, his teams have played in three consecutive 
bowl

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games from 2018-2020, winning two, but this season the program's 
success was historic for Tulane. Coach Fritz and the team made their 
mark first by winning Tulane's first-ever American Athletic Conference 
Championship after beating the University of Central Florida. The team 
then not only won the program's first Cotton Bowl, but did so in heroic 
fashion by coming from behind 28-14 at halftime and scoring 16 points 
in the final 5 minutes to beat USC and Heisman winner Caleb Williams by 
a final of 46-45. The team finished the season ranked No. 9 in both the 
coaches and AP polls at the end of the year. Following a 2-10 season in 
2021 in which Tulane lost 17 players to season-ending injuries and were 
forced to play two of their home games on the road due to damage from 
Hurricane Ida, the 10-win increase marks the greatest turnaround in 
college football history.
  The success for Tulane's football program didn't stop on the field 
though. This year alone, the team had 46 players receive Academic All-
AAC honors and holds an 87 percent graduation rate. Both are true signs 
of the high standards that Coach Fritz certainly holds his team to.
  For as much success as the team has had, I would be remiss not to 
mention a few of Coach Fritz's individual achievements. After the 
Cotton Bowl victory, Coach Fritz now has the most bowl appearances ever 
by a Tulane coach and now boasts a 236-119-1 career record. He was also 
awarded both the Bobby Dodd Coach of the Year Foundation's 2022 Dodd 
Trophy and the George Munger College Coach of the year award. He is 
deserving of all these accolades and has also been recognized for his 
efforts on giving back and making a positive impact in the New Orleans 
community.
  The only blemish on Coach Fritz's resume is that he had beat my alma 
mater, Kansas State, in Manhattan, KS, this season. Since he is a 
Kansan, I am willing to look past that one. I now ask my colleagues to 
join me in congratulating Coach Fritz on an incredible season at 
Tulane. May he see continued success throughout his career.

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