Sarkisian, Texas Believe National Title's in Sight

ATLANTA — Texas coach Steve Sarkisian’s appearance at SEC Media Days got off to an inauspicious start Tuesday when he was introduced to the strains of the Aggie War Hymn and not Texas Fight. Sarkisian ignored the major faux pas, which is probably the worst thing that has happened to him since Texas joined the SEC last year.

The Longhorns lost twice to Georgia and to Ohio State in the College Football Playoff last year in what was a strong debut for Texas in the new conference. In spite of losing some key talent to the NFL, Sarkisian expects more of the same in 2025.

“This is a new year, new faces, new team, and obviously expectations are high for our program. I’m not naive to that. I don’t put my head in the sand, and expectations are very high,” he said. “But I also say we’re the University of Texas, and the standard is the standard here, and that’s competing for championships year in and year out.”

He’ll be making that run with a new signal caller, who drew the biggest crowd of reporters since Johnny Manziel hit SEC Media Days in 2013. 

“We’ve got a new quarterback, Arch Manning, if you didn’t know,” Sarkisian quipped. “He’s replacing Quinn (Ewers), who had a great three years for us, but we’re replacing a lot of offensive linemen. We’re replacing receivers, tight ends, but that unit is really good. We’re returning the leading rusher in the SEC in Tre Wisner, which some of you probably don’t even know that, but I’ll bring that to your attention. We get Cedric Baxter back with the addition of Jarrett Gibson, who played a ton as a true freshman for us, along with Christian Clark in that room.”

Sarkisian said he was “really excited” about a new-look receiver corps, which lost Matthew Golden and Isaiah Bond to the NFL. 

“This group is really good,” he said. “DeAndre Moore is the leader of that group, who played a ton for us last year in the slot. Ryan Wingo was a true freshman last year, who probably at a lot of other schools probably had more opportunities, but when you had the room we had, he was very efficient, had a bunch of catches in critical moments for us. We’re excited about him. We brought in Emmett Mosley, a transfer from Stanford, who had 50 catches there as a true freshman … that we’re excited about, to go along with a really good recruiting class and a bunch of young guys, Parker Livingstone leading that charge of younger players in that room.”

The offensive line is a group in the midst of a major change, with four starters heading to the pros after last year. Sarkisian said he believes the new group will be good — if they gel quickly.

“D.J. Campbell will be the one coming back. But Cole Hudson has played a ton of football for us. We found out a lot about Trevor Goosby last year. He played in some big-time games against some big-time fronts, and we’re excited about him.”

Sarkisian was very excited about his defense, which returns a number of key players from last year’s team.

“This is probably the deepest and most talented defense that we’ve had, and we’ve made incremental growth on the defensive side of the ball now through four years, and we’re going to need to do that again. I think championships are won on the defensive side of the ball, and we’ve got a defensive football team we’re very excited about,” he said. “We’ve brought Anthony Hill and Michael Taaffe with us today, both All-American players for us, but it goes well beyond those two. We’ve got great depth on the defensive side of the ball: Manny Muhammad, Colin Simmons, Maraad Watson, Trey Moore, Brad Spence, Ethan Burke, Travis Shaw, Cole Brevard, Jelani McDonald, Derek Williams, just to name a few, Liona Lefau.”

Sarkisian finds himself in the strange position of realizing a 13-win season — which was once enough to win a national title — ended in disappointment last season. This year, he believes his Texas team has enough to win it all.

“When these guys are going into the locker room after a loss in the semifinals, I promise you it hurts them. We don’t forget that feeling. So we’re back to work, and the leadership on this team is full of winners, and that’s the way they want to go about the season is try to go win a championship. That’s the goal,” he said.

Texas 2025 schedule

Aug. 30: @Ohio State

Sept. 6: San Jose State

Sept. 13: UTEP

Sept. 20: Sam Houston

Oct. 4: @Florida

Oct. 11: Oklahoma (in Dallas)

Oct. 18: @Kentucky

Oct. 25: @Mississippi State

Nov. 1: Vanderbilt

Nov. 15: @Georgia

Nov. 22: Arkansas

Nov. 28: TEXAS A&M

Projected lineup

QB: #16, Arch Manning (RS-So.)

RB: #5, Quintrevion Wisner (Jr.)

TE: #88 Jack Endries (RS-Jr.-TR.)

WR (X): #1, Ryan Wingo (So.)

WR (Z): #3, Emmett Mosely V (So.-TR.)

WR (H): #0 Deandre Moore Jr. (Jr.)

LT: #74, Trevor Goosby (RS-So.)

LG: #72, Neto Umeozulu (RS-Jr.)

C: #54, Cole Hutson (Sr.)

RG: #52, DJ Campbell (Sr.)

RT: #73, Brandon Baker (So.)

JACK: #91, Ethan Burke (Sr.)

NT: #99, Cole Brevard (RS-Sr.-TR.)

DT: #44, Travis Shaw (Sr.-TR.)

BUCK: #1, Colin Simmons (So.)

MLB: #0, Anthony Hill (Jr.)

WILL: #8, Trey Moore (RS-Sr.-TR.)

CB: #6, Kobe Black (So.)

FS: #16, Michael Taaffe (RS-Sr.)

BS: #4, Jelani McDonald (Jr.)

CB: #5, Malick Muhammad (Jr.)

NICKEL: #3, Jaylon Guilbeau, Sr.