Gary Patterson was the first of the Big 12 coaches to address the press at the Big 12 Media Days on Monday. He opened by thanking everyone involved in the growth of the TCU athletic department, from alumni to university staff and players.

Patterson talked about how the Horned Frogs took quite the journey to get to this point, and now they're aspirations of one day playing for a national championship have realized.

"If you look at what we've had to accomplish and the facilities, we were walking a mile and a half to practice 15 years ago when L.T. (LaDanian Tomlinson) was our starting running back," Patterson said. "And now our practice fields are right outside. So there's a lot of things that stand in front of us but I would say as a university and as a group totally that we do feel like that we're a little bit more stable in what we're doing."

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