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October 10, 2025 15 mins
In the "Legends of the Locker Room," we have Lifetime Longhorn Defensive Back Nathan Vasher talking about Texas vs. OU week. He explains how big the week is, what it's like coming through the tunnel, and the continuous trash talk the alums have with each other about the game. He tells us what advice he's given to the team while struggling, what he would say to the defense about its execution, and what options the team has to confuse the opposing team's offense. Nathan explains what it feels like to run through the tunnel at the Cotton Bowl and shares what he believes will be a game-changing aspect of the game.  He tells us how important Duane Akina is as the defensive passing coach. Vasher shared his thoughts on the interceptions record at Texas, and we ran through all his records at the school. Lastly, how he feels about coaching at Regents School of Austin, you can hear it all here on "The Morning Kickoff Show!"
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Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Let's you say, you know the Mark Henry and Mike Hort.
You normally do the Legends of the Locker Room segment
on Thursdays, but today it's a special day because we

(00:25):
got our guy, lifetime Longhorn legend. He was inducted into
the Longhorns Hall of Honor in twenty seventeen. While he
was playing for the Texas Longhorns, he set a ton
of records and I'm gonna let him debate on if
he set the actual record in interceptions because there is

(00:46):
a story to be told behind that. He's from Texas, Canada.
He also played in the NFL with the Chicago Bears.
He's the one, the only Nathan vash or vash. How
you doing this morning.

Speaker 2 (00:57):
Brother, I'm doing well, man. How you guys doing? Good morning,
Good morning.

Speaker 1 (01:02):
We're excited to talk to you. Man. It's been it's
been a while since a lot of the folks in
the Texas area got a chance to hear your voice.
So we appreciate you taking the time to hop on
with us. But you know, this week is a special week.
You and I had a conversation the other day about
this and it just kind of changes your perspective on life.

(01:23):
We had Tommy Harris on yesterday. He said, he said,
he said, Nathan is one of the most quietest dudes,
but when this week happens, he has out of body experiences.

Speaker 3 (01:37):
Is that what said? Yes, this is the actual week
for sure. Man, No other time than right now to
show that passion, man, because I love me some Longhorns, man.

Speaker 2 (01:48):
Nate, I'm you know, I'm you know. I've always been
a fan. And my wife has been telling me for
the last two weeks. Oh my god, I love Nate's wife.
We have to go hang out. I said, you said
it up. I'm ready to row. So but let's make

(02:09):
sure that it's something sports.

Speaker 1 (02:11):
Please.

Speaker 2 (02:12):
Can we make it somethings?

Speaker 1 (02:14):
You got to do that.

Speaker 3 (02:15):
Yeah, We'll make sure we do that.

Speaker 1 (02:18):
So Nate, let's get into the football part of this, because, uh, Texas.

Speaker 2 (02:23):
Is in a yeah fun, they're in a fun.

Speaker 1 (02:27):
They're in a tough spot right now, and especially for
what they were able to achieve over the last couple
of seasons. You know, and now people are looking at
Texas in a different life. With your experience and what
you've been able to do in your life, what would
be some some advice that you would give this particular
team if you had the opportunity to speak with people.

Speaker 3 (02:49):
You know, I think it's just to quiet down the noise.
I mean, because you always have comments and criticisms from
everybody that's outside of that building. But it's understanding that
you got to play to a standard and it's not
necessarily about your opponent, but about how you prepared during
the week, and just know that you're going to get
everybody's best shot. And teams, I mean, they'll play fourteen

(03:11):
to twenty one points better than what they normally would
just because they're playing the Horns, And that's definitely a
real thing and you have to embrace that when you
come to the University of Texas and all part of
the football program.

Speaker 1 (03:25):
Yeah, and it's been interesting too because the hype coming
into the season was all about Arch. The defense obviously
has some playmakers on that side of the ball as well,
and they haven't really got themselves going, particularly Colin Simmons,
but last week he showed up making three straight stops
to kind of change that drive. What would you talk

(03:47):
to the defense about executing because last week was the
first time that we swn some cracks in the defense.

Speaker 3 (03:55):
Yeah, And I think that just shows how dominant you know,
Colin can be in the defense as far as pressure
in the quarterback and you know, just getting after that guy.
Anytime you can get the quarterback off of his mark
and on the ball with some pressure in his face
and not being on time with passes, it helps out

(04:15):
the back end for sure. And that that's a testament
just to show when you can get turnovers or I
like to problem takeaways and give the ball back to
that explosive offense as many times as you can. So
that's the name of the game, being able to stop
the run and get turnovers. And I think we'll be
in a good spot.

Speaker 2 (04:34):
Nay, you think that is It would be the Texas
advantage to try to do some shell coverages and show
one thing and do another because that defense has been
playing head up so much that we just expect them
to just go out there and dominate. Sometimes you got
to scheme a little bit. Maybe you gotta run a Blintz.

Speaker 3 (04:52):
There and then oh absolutely, And I think that's one
of the things that you confuse a quarterback time. I mean,
going from single high to two D you know, mixing
in some of those own pressures. If you can get
pressure with four, that's good. Then you have opportunity to
play more uh pass coverage on the back end. But

(05:13):
if you can start bringing bringing an extra guy and uh,
you know, just bringing more pressure like that, it confuses
the quarterback and it makes it a whole lot easier
for the for the defense to start teeing off of
those guys. So it's just you got to start fast,
you know. And and hopefully that's one of those things
that they've worked on in practice. Because it is a
special week. I mean, you can throw all the niceties out.

(05:38):
I mean, there's no love lost between these two teams,
and uh, I'm pretty sure that oh, he's gonna come
out with some stuff that we haven't seen, so you
have to be prepared for it.

Speaker 2 (05:47):
Nate, Let's be honest, and I'm not trying to get
you in trouble, but if you played a quarterback and
that quarterback had an injury, and and you you were
going to tell your guys hit him and hit him
often and reach for that hand, wouldn't that be this
frame of mind y'all would be in.

Speaker 3 (06:07):
I just feel like anytime you can be physical with
any of those guys, whether it's a running back or
lide receiver, you know that you know has issues out there.
You want to try to take advantage of that and
try to get the next guy up.

Speaker 1 (06:20):
You know.

Speaker 3 (06:20):
So some of those guys haven't had the rest during
the week, and I mean, you never know how that
it will end up. Just because somebody gets the injury,
the next guy sometimes you haven't prepared for it. He
might be pretty good too. So it's just, you know,
it's just one of those deals.

Speaker 1 (06:38):
We're talking to lifetime Longhorn, Nathan Vasher, former Chicago Bear,
and somebody that left his mark on the University of
Texas football team. As I said, he was inducted into
the Hall of Honor in twenty seventeen and an.

Speaker 2 (06:54):
Absolute dog in the return game.

Speaker 1 (06:56):
Absolutely. So I wanted to ask you this Nack Doc.
You know, we've had our conversations, and one of the
conversations is there is a record that is out there
at the University of Texas that has been strongly debated,
and that is the career interceptions record. And correct me

(07:17):
if I'm wrong in your math. You had eighteen. The
record is tied at seventeen, and you are in that.
Am I wrong for thinking that you should have eighteen?

Speaker 3 (07:29):
I think in the record book they didn't start counting
bowl game interceptions or whatever it might be. For me,
it's one of those things just because I get an
opportunity to coach young kids now and you want to
show them the right way on how to once you're
into the game, you want to be able to leave

(07:49):
it better than when you got it, and just to
have that kind of applied with being able to be productive.
I mean, that's what you want as a young player
when to Universey of Texas. You want to leave your
mark somewhere in those record books. And I mean this
is absolutely absolute pleasure just to be a part of
some of those records that are there, all those great

(08:11):
UT football players that have been there, and you know,
I still get to have that debate with you guys
all the time, and you know, enjoy it. So I'm
definitely looking forward to this season and how everything goes.

Speaker 1 (08:26):
In your senior year, you did a sept the single
season school record for the most past breakups with twenty
six and the career record with sixty four. So when
you say you got a nose for the football, you
got a nose for.

Speaker 3 (08:42):
The football, and yeah, you know, there's no doubt about that. Like,
you got to know that you're around it, and you
got to make plays when the opportunity presents itself. And
that's what we got to have this week again. So
you got to be timely, you got to be confident,
you got to be aggressive when it comes to you know,
the ball in flight, and you know, just have a

(09:02):
good time with it. And that's one of those things
that I can remember playing in this game. Uh, you know,
with all my buddies rolling in the Dallas, you know, everybody,
it seems like you're going into the enemy territory man,
because it's fifty to fifty each way and you just
never know how that game is going to go. But
this can definitely tell the direction of where the season

(09:26):
can end up. Without at the end of the.

Speaker 2 (09:28):
Day, I think that every offensive coordinator should be fired
if they throw at you. If you threw at Nathan Passion,
you need to be fired. I'm gonna not throw at you, Nate.
You not getting no breakups. You're not gonna get a
chance that interception you are on the Dion Sanders Rulee.
I'm not throwing to your side of the field.

Speaker 3 (09:50):
And the thing is, the guys are so lucky to
have Dwayne and Keena there, And I mean, he's such
an positive influence on even my coaching journey now personally
has been a mentor for me, and just you know,
just the mindset that he set in with those guys,
with our group, especially in even a few classes behind us,

(10:11):
that the ball was yours. You want to be aggressive.
We're not going to be a soft defensive backfield. It's
an insult to be called a cover corner. And you
want to be able to come up on tackles and
everything else. So it's great to have him back in
the building to be able to impart those lessons for.

Speaker 2 (10:30):
Those guys as well.

Speaker 1 (10:32):
So Nick, you mentioned it a couple of times, and
you've had an excellent journey when you're dealing with young people.
So let the folks know what you're doing right now.
And just recently you're coaching Escapades. Had you going up
against a former Texas longhorn Son.

Speaker 3 (10:52):
Oh yeah, definitely. I'm at the Recent School of Boston
here in Austin, Texas. We're having a great season right now,
right now, currently seven and oh three and oh in
district and you know, just chasing the state championship right now.
So it's been good. Vince's son goes to King K
We had a chance to see him and he had

(11:13):
a lot of support, you know, xut guys coming out
to support both sides. The best brand of football, I
can honestly say, just Texas high school football. Just here
in the area. You can always get great games to
watch on Friday nights and cheer for the guys.

Speaker 1 (11:30):
And y'all got the dub last night, if I'm not mistaken, correct, Yeah,
we did.

Speaker 3 (11:35):
Man, it was a big time. We had a Thursday
night game, actually Thursday during the day, and we had
a chance to.

Speaker 2 (11:42):
Get a big win.

Speaker 3 (11:42):
And we just continue to keep getting better every week
and keep pushing the guys to improve and and just
the same things that we talk about. We play to
a standard and it doesn't matter who the opponents across
from us. They're they're nameless, they're faceless, and we go
out there and do what we do and continue to
keep keep getting better every week.

Speaker 1 (12:02):
What will change Before we let you go, Nate, I
wanted to ask you what will be the changing factor
in this ball game for the Texas Longhorse to go
out there and get a victory. Is it a big pick,
is it a return what kind of what kind of
thoughts do you have on the game tomorrow?

Speaker 3 (12:22):
Yeah, I would like to say it might be in
the return game. I'd like to see Texas's special teams
come alive with a big play, whether it's a kick
kick or a punt return, maybe even a turnover, just
something early to get those guys juiced up to play
well on either side of the ball. The more opportunities
that you give Arcs to go out and and use

(12:47):
that offense to be able to go out and get
get more points. I think we'll be excited, but I
think just being able to get through that first initial
surge of the excitement, the nerves. I mean, it might
be some of these guys first time playing in this game.
I'm pretty sure this is Artier's first time. Did he
get any any reps in this game?

Speaker 2 (13:06):
And probably he.

Speaker 1 (13:06):
Got in for maybe one or two plays last last year.

Speaker 3 (13:11):
Yeah, but that's the thing. Like the cop Molt, it
is a different monster when it comes to just that
intensity and the speed. So I look for Texans to
come out and do something early explosively. I think that
would be great.

Speaker 1 (13:24):
I love it. I love it. There is our guy,
Nathan Vasher doing his thing. Oh before we let you go,
I want to know what was it like coming out
of that tunnel.

Speaker 3 (13:35):
Oh man, it was great? Man, Like you get chills.
I mean even talking about it right now, it's gonna
take me another day or two to get up for
this game, just because I've been so excited, been talking
about it, you know, being so fired up to see
what this team is going to do. But you walk
out the same tunnel, You're going to be shoulder shoulder

(13:58):
with the enemy over there, and you gotta be able
to not not coward down. It can't be no pump
And that's what it is, and that's what the main
thing is like. It's all about toughness and it's all
about Walton. So we're gonna see what this team is
built on and we want to see what they are,
what they're all about this weekend.

Speaker 1 (14:18):
I love it.

Speaker 2 (14:18):
I love it.

Speaker 1 (14:19):
There is Nathan Vasher, lifetime Longhorn, a legend in the NFL.
And of course I got to make sure I get
at Tommy Harris for you, man, I got you back down, do.

Speaker 3 (14:30):
You know that, please, I know he won't stop talking.

Speaker 1 (14:33):
Please do I got you. There is Nathan Vasher lifetime Longhorn.
Appreciate you, Nick Doc.

Speaker 3 (14:40):
All right, thanks guys, y'all have doing.

Speaker 1 (14:43):
Man, he is one of the guys, yea like he
is the leader of the elite people exactly Earl Campbell's
of University of Texas. That guy was special. I think
he's one of those guys that a lot of folks
you don't forget. You don't forget about him, but you
understand that this dude is a guy, and he put

(15:05):
up big time numbers.
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