Dec. 11, 2007

HOUSTON, Texas - The University of Houston football team returned to the great outdoors this afternoon, continuing its practice and preparation for the Texas Bowl on Dec. 28. The Cougars (8-4, 6-2 C-USA) are slated to square off against old foe TCU (7-5, 4-4 Mountain West Conference) in a game televised live on the NFL Network beginning at 7 pm.

UH interim head coach Chris Thurmond is pleased with the attention to detail and spirit of his Cougars heading into the second week of game preparation.

"We had a good tempo and got a lot of things done today," said Thurmond. "We worked on some competitive things at the end (of the practice), and we had a couple of big hits at the end (of practice.)

"We just want to put them in any situation possible (and) make them physical and play hard. We want them to do the right thing."

With the Cougars in the midst of the fall semester finals, Thurmond and his staff will have to work around the players schedules over the next few days in relation to practice and work outs. Houston will practice over the weekend and have one more workout Monday morning before taking off for the Christmas Holidays, to return to bowl preparation on Sunday, December 23.

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