UAB Interim Coach Mortensen Talks Memphis Matchup

By Steve Irvine

BIRMINGHAM, ALABAMA - October 17, 2025

It’s been far from a typical week for Alex Mortensen, whose tenure as the UAB football interim head coach is five days old. He’s busy helping prepare for Saturday’s Battle for the Bones rivalry with Memphis while trying to keep things for a team that is still recovering from the news of Trent Dilfer’s firing.

Part of Mortensen’s duties this week, which is new, is handling media duties. On Wednesday, he had his final meeting with beat reporters before Saturday’s game.

On this week’s practice: “Well, I think the main thing, one thing Coach Dilfer kind of told me to do, what he suggests, was trust the people around you to handle a lot of the head coaching stuff and just try go coach. Be involved with the offense. I've tried to do that as much as possible. That's not been easy, you know, because there's been a variety of other things that come up. So it's been a little bit of getting spread thin. But I think we have an opportunity to get organized in the bye week and really set up a good, efficient program in terms of how we're managing each day. But it's been good. I think the players have shown good effort and good energy at practice. So, you know, I think, so we've been pleased with that so far.”

On the day-to-day changes: “Things that Coach Dilfer was having to do, like the Monday morning media, Monday afternoon radio show, there was media this morning. Obviously, Sunday was a surprise, that was a bit of a shock. Then, on top of that, we're a morning practice team. If your first big practice was say Tuesday afternoon, you've got a whole extra half day to prepare a game plan. It already feels a little bit tight. I know it may not seem like much, but taking an hour here, an hour there and then another, it moves fast. But I do, like I said, feel really confident that once we kind of get through this week, we'll be able to create a system that works really efficiently.”

On any possible changes moving forward: “I think we'll address all that once we get through this game. Right now we try to keep as much the same as possible. That way we're not breaking the routine that guys are used to. There have been maybe a tweak here and there, but I think the biggest thing is sometimes it's not about what we're doing, it's about how we're doing it. I heard it saying a long time ago, a program doesn't work a group of people, people work the program. Part of the deal is we got to get everyone to work the program, you know, the best they can.

On his in-game sideline conversations with the quarterbacks: “Yeah, we've certainly put some thought into that and we're going to put more thought into it as the week goes. But we've got really good people. Obviously Coach Russ on defense, John Jones does a really good job with special teams, he's really good situationally. So there'll be some things that we'll probably delegate and split up so that I can try to split my time, you know, the best I can. And also, we've got good people on offense too that I trust to help the quarterbacks too as needed.

I think they probably do (have to be shorter talks) a little bit, I think. There’s probably some time I can spend with them but I just don't know that it can be exorbitant. I think it's got to be pretty quick because I don't want to lose track of the flow of the game. If there's anything that comes up situationally, timeouts, so on and so forth.  Like I said, I think to a degree, some of those things can be delegated. I think you have to make a decision. Do you delegate the game management part and do more football with a particular side of the ball? Or that can be flipped, right, and you handle the game management and somebody's handled a little bit more of the football for you. There's ways to do both and we're gonna have more conversations about that.”

On having an experienced quarterback like Jalen Kitna: “I think having someone that's been here going into second season really helps a lot because he's been through a lot. To this point, he's played a lot more football. He's still actually a fairly young player in terms of his starts and all that but having someone that you've been through with a good bit, I think it is very helpful in a situation like this, because a lot of times he already knows what you want. Now, there's still things that, specific to the opponent, there's always some unique things that present themselves every week that you want to be able to work through with him.”

On challenges of facing Memphis defense: “Memphis is very good defensively. Obviously, this is an undefeated team. They beat an SEC team. First of all, their personnel. Up front, they're physical, they're explosive, they're strong and they live in your backfield. They create a lot of negative plays through penetration in the run game and tackles for loss and then the passing game through affecting the quarterback. Sometimes they create sacks, sometimes they're just pushing the pocket. Almost on every snap, they're in the backfield. somebody's in the backfield. The front is very disruptive.  What makes it challenging is they don't always have to blitz to affect the quarterback or to affect the run game negatively because they can do it with their front. On the back end, they've got really good speed, they've got length and they're really well coached and the scheme's a little bit unique too. They present challenges in both personnel and scheme. It's both, it really is. That's not coach speak. It's part of the reason they're having the success they are. It's definitely a challenge but I think our guys are excited to go take it on, like we would be any other week.”

On added urgency this week: “I don't know that I would say that, but I do think Coach Dilfer, again, I've said this before, like not everyone really got to know him publicly, but people here came to really love him and he leaves a big void. When you lose someone like that, I think everyone around staff, players kind of goes ‘OK, man, we've got to really try to fill that void.’ I think there's probably maybe if anything, it's a response to that.”