Steve Sarkisian reveals what he learned about Texas roster during spring

Texas Longhorns head coach Steve Sarkisian has learned a lot about his team during the Longhorn spring practices. And following the Longhorns’ spring game, he took some time to go over what he has learned and the methods he used to uncover more information on his team.

“I think a few of the things were the run game, how it was gonna look, (and) what it was gonna feel like with some different runners,” said Sarkisian. “And even at that, we didn’t have Jonathan Brooks and Keelan for the majority of spring.

“Naturally, from a coaches perspective, we experiment some in spring ball with schemes, with personnels, (and) with some position changes… so we experimented with a lot of those things. And then obviously defensively too, you can take a few more chances throughout the spring knowing there’s not as many consequences because you’re not having a game to play. And I think we found out some things about us from a pressure standpoint.

College coaches are consistently tinkering with their roster during the spring. It is not uncommon for a player to be recruited at one position only to find himself at another or even on the other side of the football. Take, for example, former Texas Longhorns linebacker Demarvion Overshown. Overshown started his college career as a defensive back, but was moved to linebacker after two years in the program.

Still, the tinkering with the roster was not the most significant thing Sarkisian uncovered about his team. It was actually the amount of debt Texas is heading into the 2023 season with at multiple positions.

“A lot of these things I’m talking about, we don’t show in a spring game. But in the end, I think the biggest thing we found out about our team is we have really good depth. You can go position by position, and I feel very comfortable; if the starter isn’t in, the backup doesn’t look much different. And we haven’t been in that space here my first couple of years. Today, I kind of feel like if so and so goes down, the next guy going in we all feel very comfortable with. That part for me was the thing that I got out of spring ball; that we have depth on this team now to where we have a very solid two-deep and at some positions three-deep where we’re very comfortable with the players that we have,” said Sarkisian.

The amount of depth the Longhorns have throughout their roster it’s only a testament to Sarkisian’s ability to recruit and develop players. That depth we’ll go a long way in the Longhorns’ attempt to capture the Big 12 title and possibly a College Football Playoff bid at the end of the season.