Steve Sarkisian ‘fired up’ by depth in quarterback room

Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian has recruited the quarterback position incredibly well at Texas, leaning on his experience, scheme, and the former quarterbacks that he’s developed to do so. That’s led to an incredibly deep quarterback room in Austin.

Now, as Sarkisian explained on Always College Football, he’s fired up by the team’s depth at quarterback.

“I’m really fired up about that room,” Steve Sarkisian said. “I think, you know, that collectively we are a very talented group, a group that works very hard, and works very well together.”

While Texas has six quarterbacks currently listed on its roster, there are three who are the most exciting. Quinn Ewers and Arch Manning were both five-star recruits, according to the On3 Industry Rankings. Then, Maalik Murphy is a former four-star recruit who has impressed people at Texas.

“You know, Greg [McElroy], you’ve been in enough quarterback rooms, you know when that room is good. When guys are engaging with one another, having fun with one another. They’ve got good rapport. They’re competing, but they’re doing it in a way where they’re trying to get better individually, but also supporting the other guy and knowing the things that he’s working on. So, we have that.”

All eyes are going to be on starting quarterback Quinn Ewers, who is still just 20 years old after reclassifying from the Class of 2022 to 2021. There is still room for him to grow. He flashed his potential, but there is going to be pressure on him with the talent sitting behind him at quarterback.

Sarkisian explained that Ewers has put in the work and improved throughout the offseason.

“Quinn has had a great offseason, and in my opinion, it started in December and prepping for the bowl game. I thought he prepared very well. He played really well in the bowl game. We didn’t play great around him. Then that continued into winter conditioning and spring ball, and he’s been fantastic in the summer. He looks great. He’s in the best shape of his life.”

Quinn Ewers is still a big unknown for Texas

While Quinn Ewers has flashed his potential and talent, he and Texas struggled to put it all together during the 2022 season. Because of that, he’s still an unknown for the Longhorns. On3’s JD PicKell explained this during an episode of The Hard Count.

“When you look at this Texas offense, what Texas could be is scary for the rest of college football. Like all weapons they have, Xavier Worthy, AD Mitchell, Isaiah Nayor, who we haven’t really even seen hit the field just yet because he was injured last year, but a lot of juice around him and what he could be. Ja’Tavion Sanders, like there’s a lot there on the Texas offense to make good on in the pass game,” PicKell said.

“And if Quinn Ewers can be a consistent version of what we saw against Alabama before he got hurt, a consistent version of what we saw against Oklahoma, then you unlock the rest of that potential on the roster. You unlock the rest of that potential on the offense. The way I look at this Texas offense, it’s like a Ferrari, you’ve just got to be able to put gas in it with Quinn Ewers. You’ve just got to be able to turn it on, because if Quinn Ewers is inconsistent, and I know it looked like at least he was dinged up at times last year when it came to the Oklahoma State game…But the bottom line is he threw 30 incompletions against Oklahoma State on the road.”