The stat Texas needs to improve to win a national title

We are in the thick of the offseason, but that does not slow speculation on the 2025 college football season and beyond. You, the listeners of Andy and Ari On3, have questions, and I am here to answer them.

From Joe:
How much credit does Steve Sarkisian get in college football for the work he’s done at Texas?

From Steve in San Antonio:
No this is not an Arch Manning question.  You’re welcome.  Maybe it’s just me but I’ve been surprised by Sark being labeled the offensive genius/guru with all of the very obvious and serious red zone and goal line issues they’ve had.  Since Sark has had them relevant, regardless of who they are playing, the offense marches up and down the field but once they hit the red zone or goal line, they come to a screeching halt and issues ensue ( I won’t mention Ohio State or Red River 2023).

I don’t know that Sark has gotten the appropriate heat for these deficiencies and had they just been average inside the 20, Texas could have a natty right now.

How does he fix these issues if they’ve plagued Texas multiple seasons with all that high-end talent? 

Why has the media overlooked it when it’s of the utmost importance and many in your line of work are picking them to win it all this season?  You can’t win it all if you can’t score a TD when you have to.

Steve’s question will help us answer Joe’s question. Because Sarkisian has fixed the most pressing issues Texas had when he got the job in 2021, we now can nitpick him on things like red zone percentage.

In other words, Sark repaired the cracks in the foundation and rebuilt the frame of the house. Now we’re arguing about light fixtures.

This is, of course, huge progress for Texas. And Sarkisian and his staff deserve most of the credit.

The most important repair they made was turning Texas into a program that developed talent again. In the tail end of the Mack Brown era and through the Charlie Strong and Tom Herman eras, the Longhorns simply did not turn the highly touted recruits they signed into NFL players with any regularity. Teams that can’t do that don’t tend to win championships, and they’re susceptible to losses to teams that — on paper — are less talented.

From 2011 to 2022, Texas produced two first-round draft picks (safety Kenny Vaccaro in 2013 and defensive tackle Malcom Brown in 2015). In 2016 and 2017, the Longhorns had just one player drafted. In 2022, they didn’t have a single player drafted.

Before the Sarkisian era, the last Texas offensive player drafted in the first round was Vince Young in 2006. The last first-round offensive lineman was Mike Williams in 2002.

Since Sark took over, Texas has produced six first-rounders (tailback Bijan Robinson in 2023, defensive tackle Byron Murphy and receiver Xavier Worthy in 2024 and offensive tackle Kelvin Banks, DB Jahdae Barron and receiver Matthew Golden in 2025). The Longhorns have had 23 players taken in the past two drafts, and it’s possible they touch double digits again in 2026.

Those are the kind of numbers Nick Saban produced at Alabama and Urban Meyer produced at Ohio State and Kirby Smart produces at Georgia. It’ll win you a lot of games.

Sarkisian has re-opened the Texas NFL production factory. His athletic director, Chris Del Conte, has gotten donors who couldn’t seem to stay on the same page in previous eras to pull in the same direction since the dawn of NIL. Texas has the big-picture issues taken care of.

Now let’s talk about the red zone.

Steve isn’t wrong. Texas was bad in the red zone last season. It’s not just an anecdotal memory of the toss play that Ohio State safety Caleb Downs blew up near the goal line in a one-possession Cotton Bowl semifinal in the fourth quarter. Texas ranked 101st in the nation in red zone scoring percentage at 79.7. 

That’s the bad news. The more promising news is that Texas tied with Indiana for second in the nation in red zone trips last season with 69. The difference is the Hoosiers turned 92.8 percent of those trips into points. Indiana scored 55 red zone touchdowns, which led the nation and was seven more than second-place Penn State, which played three more games than the Hoosiers did. Texas, meanwhile, scored 44 red zone touchdowns in 16 games.

To Steve’s point, if Texas can get to a middle-of-the-pack red zone scoring percentage, that probably adds another four or five touchdowns. That could mean the difference between a playoff exit in an earlier round and a national title.

How does Texas fix the issue? Running back play certainly seems to be a factor. When the Longhorns had Robinson in 2022, they finished 19th in red zone scoring percentage. They dropped to No. 90 the next year.

A deeper running back room this season could help. Recall that the Longhorns lost presumed starter C.J. Baxter and freshman Christian Clark to season-ending injuries in August. 

Quarterback Arch Manning also will shoulder much of the responsibility. After Quinn Ewers injured his ankle late last season, Sarkisian used Manning in a QB run package. As the starter, Manning’s size and speed should make him an option for which defenses have to account near the goal line. 

Red zone percentage will be a critical stat to watch for Texas this season. It’s one of the only things the Longhorns have struggled with during CFP runs the past two seasons. They’ll likely continue to rank among the national leaders in getting inside the opponent’s 20-yard line. If they start punching in a few more touchdowns, they might be unstoppable.

From Tom:
Will we ever get back to a point where power conference teams non-conference games were all against other power conference teams? (For example, Missouri’s 1976 non-conference was USC, Illinois, Ohio State, North Carolina.)

The addition of the 12th regular-season at the start of this century probably eliminates the possibility of all power-conference schedules returning. The TV networks and streaming networks paying the leagues would love a return to this, and depending on how the next iteration of the CFP is set up, we should see more power conference vs. power conference games.

And for certain schools, an all power conference schedule probably would be helpful. 

Earlier this week, Texas Tech coach Joey McGuire was complaining about the perception of conferences during an interview on SiriusXM. “We’ve got to take some of the bias out of conferences – that, ‘This is a tougher conference because of this and this and this.’ Let’s fight it out on the field,” McGuire said.

He’s talking about CFP selection, and that would be fine if the conferences were equal. But they’re not. The Big 12 is demonstrably weaker at the top than the Big Ten and SEC. Texas Tech could help itself close this perception gap by playing some Big Ten and SEC teams in the non-conference. That would be fighting it out on the field. 

So who is Texas Tech playing in the non-conference this season?

Arkansas Pine-Bluff, Kent State and Oregon State.

Maybe it gets better in 2026.

Nope, it’s Abilene Christian, Oregon State and Sam Houston State.

At least Texas Tech has N.C. State scheduled in 2027 alongside Arkansas Pine-Bluff and North Texas.

Slates like these will do little to help the Red Raiders. Their CFP participation likely will depend on whether they can win the Big 12 title, because they won’t have any quality non-conference wins to bolster their resume if they don’t win the league. So McGuire needs to visit with his athletic director Kirby Hocutt and get some better non-conference games scheduled.

They don’t have to schedule Ohio State and Georgia. But they do need to be trying to schedule teams like Illinois, Minnesota, Ole Miss and South Carolina. And if those teams don’t want to come to Lubbock, the Red Raiders should take a check, hit the road and, as McGuire said, “fight it out on the field.”

From John:

What are the top three books about college football that you would recommend to someone who knows nothing about CFB?

It is beach reading season, so here’s a trio of books that would be great for anyone who either loves college football or just wants to learn more about it.

The Opening Kickoff: The Tumultuous Birth of a Football Nation, Dave Revsine

Revsine isn’t just a great TV host. He dives deep into the creation of the sport. If you thought the NIL era was wild, it has nothing on the turn of the 20th century.

Meat Market: Inside the Smash-Mouth World of College Football Recruiting, Bruce Feldman

To understand college football, you need to understand recruiting. There isn’t a better book on the subject. Feldman spent a year in the early 2000s with Ed Orgeron’s Ole Miss staff, and the result is a fascinating look at how the sausage got made in that era.

The Junction Boys: How Ten Days in Hell with Bear Bryant Forged a Championship Team, Jim Dent

The story of Bear Bryant’s first preseason practice at Texas A&M is the stuff of legend, and it will get you fired up for the season (even though a coach would get put in jail for this stuff now). 

My co-host Ari Wasserman also recommends Michael Rosenberg’s War As They Knew It: Woody Hayes, Bo Schembechler, and America in a Time of Unrest. This one delves into the most interesting period in the Michigan-Ohio State rivalry, and it will help you understand why that game means so much to so many people.

If you want a better window into some of the changes in college football now, I’d also recommend a book about a different kind of football. Joshua Robinson and Jonathan Clegg’s The Club: How the English Premier League Became the Wildest, Richest, Most Disruptive Force in Sports explains the dawn of the Premier League in England. And you’ll be shocked at the similarities between English soccer in 1990 and college football in 2025.

A Random Ranking

As I write this, I’m preparing to head to Tampa for a Metallica concert. Time to rank my favorite Metallica songs…

1. One
2. Master of Puppets
3. Sad But True
4. For Whom the Bell Tolls
5. Enter Sandman
6. Fade To Black
7. The Unforgiven
8. Fuel
9. Seek and Destroy
10. Nothing Else Matters