Steve Sarkisian provides injury updates for Texas ahead of Houston game

The Texas Longhorns had a bye week following their heartbreaking loss to rival Oklahoma, allowing the hearts of fans to heal and the bodies of their players.

The Longhorns will visit the Houston Cougars this weekend in their first matchup with a team that’s new to the Big 12 the season. Ahead of the in-state showdown, Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian provided a promising injury update regarding specific players and the program as a whole.

“All of the guys practiced today, so I think that’s probably the first part that’s really positive where last week we really limited a lot of guys,” Sarkisian said. “We limited Jake [Majors] to all about nothing, we limited JT [Sanders] to all about nothing, we limited Ryan [Watts] to all about nothing, we really wanted to try to get them healthy.”

Sarkisian kept his injured players out of practice during the team’s bye week in order to get them healthy, but now that it’s game week, it seems that the needed week of rest is paying off.

Watts missed the entire Red River Rivalry game due to a lower-body injury he suffered the week prior versus Kansas, and both Sanders and Watts were only available on a limited basis in the second half against Oklahoma as they battled their own injuries.

All three starters seem like they’re in much better shape now, but there’s still some concern over offensive lineman Cole Hutson who’s missed the last three games following a knee injury suffered against Wyoming.

“Today we came back, everybody practiced, probably the most limited of the group was Cole Hutson, but they all practiced. Now, as the week goes on I’m gonna have to make that decision later in the week of who is really ready to play to be fair to them to give them that chance to really practice on Tueaday and Wednesday in our physical practices to make sure they’re in position to perform and to do it at a high level,” Sarkisian explained.

“But I was encouraged today that they were all out there going, but again, as the week goes on I’ll have probably a very cleaner update of who’s really going to be available Saturday. But today was a really good sign.”

It sounds like the Longhorns will be a lot healthier across the board following their bye week, which is a great sign for Texas as they face Houston this Saturday at 4:00 p.m. ET in a game airing on FOX.