Recent Kansas State graduate Joe Tillery was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis when he was an infant, and his life expectancy meant he wouldn't live to attend college. He did, benefiting from advances in medicine and a positive spirit to live beyond the years of most patients of this deadly disease. Now 25, Tillery finds himself in the hospital less and living life more, including his passion for sharing his thoughts about Kansas State sports on his YouTube channel. Tillery, like Fitz, is living beyond his life expectancy, so call it stolen, borrowed, or earned extra time; passing that expiration date is liberating. After a year in Minnesota with his fiancée, Lauren, Tillery has returned to the Kansas City area to live a life beyond what medicine expected for most of his life.

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Blueville Nursery in Manhattan, Kansas, sponsors the Life of Fitz podcast.

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Tim Fitzgerald is a sports journalist who writes, appears on TV and radio, produces daily YouTube videos, and is a long-time podcaster. He has served as the publisher of GoPowercat.com, a website focused on Kansas State sports, for over 25 years. Fitz also has metastatic Stage Four prostate cancer, so during the initial stages of the pandemic, his doctors advised him to stay home and lie low. Now, after a brief period of remission, Fitz is back in the fight for his life, but this podcast lives on. Welcome to his life and the Life of Fitz podcast.

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Blaine Younger is a singer-songwriter originally from Victoria, Kansas. It was in his home state, near his alma mater, Kansas State, where he toured and released several projects throughout the 2000s. In 2016, Blaine won the Nashville Songwriters Association International song contest with his song "PatiOasis," which introduced him into the Nashville songwriting community. Younger's first studio album since 2010 was recently released, and he has since reformed The Blaine Younger Band, which is touring their home state of Kansas and beyond throughout the year. Blaine currently resides in Nashville with his wife and children, where he writes songs daily for himself and other artists, including more than 30 independent cuts. 

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Blueville Nursery in Manhattan, Kansas, sponsors the Life of Fitz podcast.

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Tim Fitzgerald is a sports journalist who writes, appears on TV and radio, produces daily YouTube videos, and is a long-time podcaster. He has served as the publisher of GoPowercat.com, a website focused on Kansas State sports, for over 25 years. Fitz also has metastatic Stage Four prostate cancer, so during the initial stages of the pandemic, his doctors advised him to stay home and lie low. Now, after a brief period of remission, Fitz is back in the fight for his life, but this podcast lives on. Welcome to his life and the Life of Fitz podcast.

Sign up for GoPowercat VIP access and get your first month for just $1!
Want the latest Kansas State headlines sent to your inbox? Click to sign up for GoPowercat's daily newsletter! 
Make sure you subscribe to Life of Fitz at your favorite podcast provider, including Apple, Spotify or Amazon.
Follow @LifeofFitz

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Chad Weiberg assumed the role of Oklahoma State Vice President and Athletic Director in July of 2021 after having spent the previous four years as OSU's Deputy Athletic Director. The timing of his promotion to athletic director lined up with seismic shifts in the national landscape of college sports. Realignment within the Big 12 Conference and the emergence of Name, Image and Likeness both occurred within a month of Weiberg's start date. With that as the backdrop, in the modernized world of college athletics, Weiberg's four years in charge at OSU have piled up team and individual NCAA Championships. Weiberg has made three head coach hires, successfully recruiting Jacie Hoyt (women's basketball), Steve Lutz (men's basketball) and David Taylor (wrestling) to Stillwater. Oklahoma State hosted NCAA Championship events in men's and women's cross country (2022), wrestling (2023) and men's and women's tennis (2024) under Weiberg, providing the Cowboys and Cowgirls with added visibility on the national level. During his tenure as Deputy Athletic Director, he played a pivotal role in successfully navigating OSU Athletics through the COVID-19 pandemic. Notably, he developed a partnership with the Oklahoma State University Center for Health Sciences that helped produce the planning and resources to keep Cowboy and Cowgirl student-athletes healthy, safe, and ready for competition. Weiberg was a key figure in several important initiatives that benefited both student-athletes and fans. A little more than a year after Weiberg's arrival, OSU added a director of counseling and sport psychology position within the athletic department to serve the mental health needs of student-athletes better. Weiberg is a 1994 graduate of OSU with a degree in business administration. He earned a master's in business administration from OSU in 2002. After earning his undergraduate degree, he served as the director of corporate sales and donor relations for OSU Athletics until 1999. He served as senior director of field operations for the OSU Alumni Association from 1999-2002 before becoming the director of development for the OSU Foundation/College of Business Administration from 2002-03. He held a similar role for OSU Athletics from 2003-04 before moving to Kansas State. At K-State, Weiberg served the KSU Foundation as Director of Corporate Relations for a year before becoming the Director of Major Gifts for K-State Athletics in 2005. Weiberg assumed the lead role for K-State Athletics' Ahearn Fund in 2009 and, for his team's efforts, was recognized as the National Fundraiser of the Year by the National Association of Athletic Development Directors in 2014. Weiberg was the Senior Associate Athletic Director for Development when he left K-State in 2015 to become the Deputy Director of Athletics at Texas Tech University, a role he served in for two years before returning to his alma mater in 2017. College athletics have played a key role in Weiberg's life from an early age. His father, Mick, and brother, Brett were both college basketball head coaches and his brother, Jared, played basketball at OSU under Eddie Sutton for a year before moving into the role of team manager. Weiberg's uncle, Kevin, served as commissioner of the Big 12. Weiberg and his wife, Jodi, have two children, Ella and Grant.

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Blueville Nursery in Manhattan, Kansas, sponsors the Life of Fitz podcast.

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Tim Fitzgerald is a sports journalist who writes, does TV, radio, daily YouTube videos, and is a long-time podcaster. He has served as publisher of GoPowercat.com, a website that focuses on Kansas State sports, for more than 25 years. Fitz also has metastatic Stage Four prostate cancer, so during the initial stages of the pandemic, his doctors advised him to stay home and lay low. Now, after a brief period of remission, Fitz is back in the fight for his life, but this podcast lives on. Welcome to his life and the Life of Fitz podcast.

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Former Kansas State safety Erick Harper is in his fourth year as athletics director at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas, or UNLV, after being promoted to serve as UNLV's 14th permanent Director of Athletics on Jan. 1, 2022. Harper served as UNLV's Interim Director of Athletics from August 16, 2021, to December 31, 2021. As UNLV's AD, Harper oversees all aspects of the athletics department and the Thomas & Mack Center, including general operations, fiscal affairs, facilities, strategic planning, and external relations. Prior to becoming Director of Athletics, Harper served nine years as UNLV's senior associate athletics director for development. Harper has been in university athletics administration for more than 30 years. He joined UNLV as associate athletics director for development in 2012. In that role, he oversaw fundraising efforts for the department and served as a sports administrator for multiple sports, including football and women's golf. Prior to joining UNLV, Harper served as associate athletics director for football operations at the University of Arizona from 2003 to 2011. He began his athletics administrative career at Kansas State University (1990-2003), where he served in development, marketing, and compliance roles, as well as in a sport administrator capacity for multiple sports. Harper earned his bachelor's degree in 1992 from Kansas State, where he was a four-year starter and standout defensive back for the Wildcats football team. He later earned a master's in organizational management and leadership from Ashford University in 2013.  Harper and his wife, Dr. Patrice Hester-Harper, who holds three degrees (bachelor's, master's, PhD) from UNLV and is currently associate vice president for development and principal gifts for the university, have two daughters, Sydney (17) and Avery (8)..

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Blueville Nursery in Manhattan, Kansas, sponsors the Life of Fitz podcast.

***

Tim Fitzgerald is a sports journalist who writes, does TV, radio, daily YouTube videos, and is a long-time podcaster. He has served as publisher of GoPowercat.com, a website that focuses on Kansas State sports, for more than 25 years. Fitz also has metastatic Stage Four prostate cancer, so during the initial stages of the pandemic, his doctors advised him to stay home and lay low. Now, after a brief period of remission, Fitz is back in the fight for his life, but this podcast lives on. Welcome to his life and the Life of Fitz podcast.

Sign up for GoPowercat VIP access and get your first month for just $1!
Want the latest Kansas State headlines sent to your inbox? Click to sign up for GoPowercat's daily newsletter! 
Make sure you subscribe to Life of Fitz at your favorite podcast provider, including Apple, Spotify or Amazon.
Follow @LifeofFitz

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Known as a great offensive mind and developer of quarterback talent, Matt Wells boasts over 25 years of coaching experience. He is in his second season at K-State, serving as the offensive coordinator, quarterbacks coach, and associate head coach since 2025. Last season, he served as co-offensive coordinator. Wells hit the ground running in his first season on staff, tutoring Avery Johnson to a school-record 25 touchdown passes, while his sophomore signal caller ranked fifth in school history in passing yards (2,712) and completions (217). Additionally, Johnson was one of only five players in the nation and one of three from Power 4 schools to record at least 2,700 passing yards and 600 rushing yards. He was also one of nine signal callers nationally with at least 25 passing touchdowns and seven rushing touchdowns. Under the direction of Wells, Johnson guided an offense that finished in the top 15 nationally in four offensive categories, including rushing yards per carry (second, 6.08) and rushing yards per game (11th, 215.5). K-State also ranked in the top 10 in school history in 15-game or season categories. Among those were school record for offensive yards per play (6.57) and rushing yards per carry (6.08), while the Wildcats tied for third in passing touchdowns (25), ranked fourth in offensive yards per game (426.8), fifth in total offense yards (5,549), sixth in rushing yards (2,801), seventh in completions (222) and 10th in both passing yards (2,749) and pass attempts (383). Wells, who boasts nine years of head coaching experience, came to Manhattan after spending the previous two seasons at Oklahoma as an advisor to the head coach and offensive analyst. Prior to that, he served as the head coach at his alma mater, Utah State, from 2013 through 2018 and at Texas Tech from 2019 to 2021. In addition to coaching quarterbacks during his 27-year coaching career, he has also spent time tutoring wide receivers and tight ends. In total, Wells has been a part of 13 bowl teams and two conference championships. Wells earned his bachelor's degree in business marketing from Utah State in 1996, graduating cum laude. He and his wife, Jen, have two daughters, Jadyn and Ella, and one son, Wyatt.

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Blueville Nursery in Manhattan, Kansas, sponsors the Life of Fitz podcast.

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Tim Fitzgerald is a sports journalist who writes, does TV, radio, daily YouTube videos, and is a long-time podcaster. He has served as publisher of GoPowercat.com, a website that focuses on Kansas State sports, for more than 25 years. Fitz also has metastatic Stage Four prostate cancer, so during the initial stages of the pandemic, his doctors advised him to stay home and lay low. Now, after a brief period of remission, Fitz is back in the fight for his life, but this podcast lives on. Welcome to his life and the Life of Fitz podcast.

Sign up for GoPowercat VIP access and get your first month for just $1!
Want the latest Kansas State headlines sent to your inbox? Click to sign up for GoPowercat's daily newsletter! 
Make sure you subscribe to Life of Fitz at your favorite podcast provider, including Apple, Spotify or Amazon.
Follow @LifeofFitz

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Shanele Stires graduated from Salina Central (Kan.) High School in 1990. That is not only Fitz's alma mater, but he also covered high school sports for his hometown newspaper that year, watching Stires excel in multiple sports for the Salina Central Mustangs. After high school, Stires attended Kansas State on a track scholarship but then headed to Cloud County Community College after a year so she could try her hand at college basketball. It worked out perfectly, with Stires returning to Manhattan the next three years (1992-95) to play hoops for the Wildcats, averaging 16.6 points, 8.7 rebounds, and 2.2 assists per game. Stires scored 1,344 career points, grabbed 701 career rebounds, and earned Kodak All-America honorable mention, First-Team All-Big Eight honors, and runner-up in Conference Player of the Year voting as a senior in 1995. After that was a 10-year run as a professional player, including a stretch in the recently formed WNBA with the Minnesota Lynx before entering coaching. Stires' career has led her to San Luis Obispo, California, where she is preparing to start her fourth season as the head women's coach for the Cal Poly Mustangs. Stires, 53, received her bachelor's degree in social science from Kansas State in 1995 and a master's degree in collegiate athletics from San Francisco in 2016.

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Blueville Nursery in Manhattan, Kansas, sponsors the Life of Fitz podcast.

***

Tim Fitzgerald is a sports journalist who writes, does TV, radio, daily YouTube videos, and is a long-time podcaster. He has served as publisher of GoPowercat.com, a website that focuses on Kansas State sports, for more than 25 years. Fitz also has metastatic Stage Four prostate cancer, so during the initial stages of the pandemic, his doctors advised him to stay home and lay low. Now, after a brief period of remission, Fitz is back in the fight for his life, but this podcast lives on. Welcome to his life and the Life of Fitz podcast.

Sign up for GoPowercat VIP access and get your first month for just $1!
Want the latest Kansas State headlines sent to your inbox? Click to sign up for GoPowercat's daily newsletter! 
Make sure you subscribe to Life of Fitz at your favorite podcast provider, including Apple, Spotify or Amazon.
Follow @LifeofFitz

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hunter Woodhall is an American track and field Paralympian and the first double amputee to earn a Division I NCAA track scholarship, and is married to fellow Olympian and Kansas State assistant track and field coach Tara Davis-Woodhall. In 2024, Woodhall won his first Paralympic gold medal in the men's 400m T62 event in Paris. He also won a bronze medal in the same event at the 2020 Tokyo Paralympics. Born in Georgia while his father was serving in the military. Woodhall's parents decided to amputate both of his legs at 11 months old due to fibular hemimelia. He was raised in Syracuse, Utah, Woodhall was initially given prosthetic lower legs as a child but switched to carbon fiber "blades" while still in grade school, which unlocked his live for running. Hunter and Tara were wed on October 16, 2022.

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Blueville Nursery in Manhattan, Kansas, sponsors the Life of Fitz podcast.

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Tim Fitzgerald is a sports journalist who writes, does TV, radio, daily YouTube videos, and is a long-time podcaster. He has served as publisher of GoPowercat.com, a website that focuses on Kansas State sports, for more than 25 years. Fitz also has metastatic Stage Four prostate cancer, so during the initial stages of the pandemic, his doctors advised him to stay home and lay low. Now, after a brief period of remission, Fitz is back in the fight for his life, but this podcast lives on. Welcome to his life and the Life of Fitz podcast.

Sign up for GoPowercat VIP access and get your first month for just $1!
Want the latest Kansas State headlines sent to your inbox? Click to sign up for GoPowercat's daily newsletter! 
Make sure you subscribe to Life of Fitz at your favorite podcast provider, including Apple, Spotify or Amazon.
Follow @LifeofFitz

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Scot Pollard grew up in San Diego, and after considering Arizona as his college basketball destination, he chose Kansas so he could play for Coach Roy Williams. After a stellar college career, Pollard was selected as the 19th pick in the 1997 NBA Draft, going to the Detroit Pistons. Pollard played for five NBA franchises during his 10-year professional career, with the bulk of his career spent with the Sacramento Kings and the Indiana Pacers. Except for his first season, Pollard appeared in the NBA Playoffs, including in the 2007 NBA playoffs with the Cleveland Cavaliers. He won a championship in his final season (2007–08) with the Boston Celtics. Pollard appeared as a contestant on the TV show Survivor in 2016. All of those life accomplishments are now overshadowed by the victory he claimed in 2024, when a genetic failure of his heart led to the need for a donor heart, which seemed doubtful at the time. A heart, however, was found, and Pollard continues to recover from the successful surgery at his home in Carmel, Indiana, where he lives with his wife Dawn and their four children.

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Blueville Nursery in Manhattan, Kansas, sponsors the Life of Fitz podcast.

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Tim Fitzgerald is a sports journalist who writes, does TV, radio, daily YouTube videos, and is a long-time podcaster. He has served as publisher of GoPowercat.com, a website that focuses on Kansas State sports, for more than 25 years. Fitz also has metastatic Stage Four prostate cancer, so during the initial stages of the pandemic, his doctors advised him to stay home and lay low. Now, after a brief period of remission, Fitz is back in the fight for his life, but this podcast lives on. Welcome to his life and the Life of Fitz podcast.

Sign up for GoPowercat VIP access and get your first month for just $1!
Want the latest Kansas State headlines sent to your inbox? Click to sign up for GoPowercat's daily newsletter! 
Make sure you subscribe to Life of Fitz at your favorite podcast provider, including Apple, Spotify or Amazon.
Follow @LifeofFitz

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Chris Klieman followed the legendary Bill Snyder as Kansas State's football coach in 2019. In less than three months, Klieman will kick off his seventh season as head coach of the Wildcats. The K-State program has played in a bowl five of Klieman's first six seasons, with only the chaotic pandemic season in 2020 being the exception. Overall, he is 48-28 as K-State's coach and has won nine or more games each of the last three seasons, winning a Big 12 championship and two bowl games in that stretch. Klieman appeared on Life of Fitz in 2023, and since then, much has changed about college football and more. Welcome to the premiere of Season 6 of the Life of Fitz podcast.

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Blueville Nursery in Manhattan, Kansas, sponsors the Life of Fitz podcast.

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Tim Fitzgerald is a sports journalist who writes, does TV, radio, daily YouTube videos, and is a long-time podcaster. He has served as publisher of GoPowercat.com, a website that focuses on Kansas State sports, for more than 25 years. Fitz also has metastatic Stage Four prostate cancer, so during the initial stages of the pandemic, his doctors advised him to stay home and lay low. Now, after a brief period of remission, Fitz is back in the fight for his life, but this podcast lives on. Welcome to his life and the Life of Fitz podcast.

Sign up for GoPowercat VIP access and get your first month for just $1!
Want the latest Kansas State headlines sent to your inbox? Click to sign up for GoPowercat's daily newsletter! 
Make sure you subscribe to Life of Fitz at your favorite podcast provider, including Apple, Spotify or Amazon.
Follow @LifeofFitz

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Troy Hartman's story is full of tragedy and hope. His story of alcoholism and the horror it brought to his life is powerful, and it's one he shares so people can understand the darkness in which he traveled until the power of forgiveness changed his life. That forgiveness grew from the death of a close friend while attending College of the Ozarks in Branson, Missouri, where he went to a local church and began to serve. In 2003, Troy had the opportunity to help start North Point Church in Springfield, Missouri, and met his wife, Lacey, while serving. The Hartmans were on staff at NPC for 11 years but felt God asking them to leave a place they loved to start a new church. Troy and Lacey and their daughters Jovi and Jade moved to Manhattan in 2015, knowing one person. In the first few months, they lived in Manhattan, a team of 40 people committed to the launch of Rock Hills Church. Rock Hills officially started September 13, 2015, at the Boys and Girls Club of Manhattan, and over the years, the church has welcomed thousands of men, women, children, military personnel, and college students to find and follow Jesus. Rock Hills relocated to the former Seth Child Cinema in Manhattan in 2017, and after several years of month-to-month rent, the church was able to purchase its "Nine Acres of Hope." The remarkable growth of Rock Hills has now led the church to renovate two theaters into one larger auditorium for their three services per Sunday, which are typically packed with a wonderful congregation of believers of many ages and different backgrounds. That congregation now includes Tim and Becky Fitzgerald, as well as Tim's older sister, Amy, who recently moved to Manhattan to teach at Kansas State.

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Tim Fitzgerald is a sports journalist who writes, does TV, radio, daily YouTube videos, and is a long-time podcaster. He has served as publisher of GoPowercat.com, a website that focuses on Kansas State sports, for more than 25 years. Fitz also has metastatic Stage Four prostate cancer, so during the initial stages of the pandemic, his doctors advised him to stay home and lay low. Now, after a brief period of remission, Fitz is back in the fight for his life, but this podcast lives on. Welcome to his life and the Life of Fitz podcast.

Sign up for GoPowercat VIP access and get your first month for just $1!

Want the latest Kansas State headlines sent to your inbox? Click to sign up for GoPowercat's daily newsletter! 

Make sure you subscribe to Life of Fitz at your favorite podcast provider, including Apple, Spotify or Amazon.

Follow @LifeofFitz

To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices