Texas coach Steve Sarkisian has 'a ton of respect' for Michigan: 'You don't go to three-straight College Football Playoffs if you don't have a great program'

No. 9 Michigan Wolverines football will host No. 4 Texas Saturday afternoon at The Big House in what will be the first-ever regular-season matchup between the two bluebloods. The Wolverines and Longhorns faced off just once, with Texas winning 38-37 in the Jan. 1, 2005, Rose Bowl.

This will be a showdown of two College Football Playoff teams from last season. Texas fell to Washington in the semifinal, while Michigan beat Alabama and the Huskies on the way to the program’s 12th-ever national championship.

Texas head man Steve Sarkisian raved about the Michigan program during his Monday press conference.

“A ton of respect for this program, for this team,” Sarkisian said. “You don’t go to three-straight College Football Playoffs if you don’t have a great program, and they’ve got a great program.

“Obviously, capping it off last year being national champs. They’re 41-3 in their last 44 games. They’ve won 16 games in a row. They’ve won 23 straight home games. So these guys know how to win. You can see it in their style of play. They play with a great deal of confidence. They believe in one another, so it’s a heck of a challenge for our team.

“But this is why you come to Texas, is to play in games like this. And to think this is the first time in the history of college football that Texas is going to play Michigan in the regular season is pretty awesome and pretty humbling to be part of that. We’re definitely looking forward to the opportunity.”

A highlight of Texas’ 2023 season was heading on the road for a tough Week 2 challenge, conquering Alabama by a final score of 34-24, snapping the Crimson Tide’s 21-game home winning streak.

The Longhorns replaced quite a bit of production from last year’s team, but key pieces, including starting quarterback Quinn Ewers, are back.

“One of the keys is that you have to have great poise and composure when you’re on the road in these types of environments,” Sarkisian said. “This is a game of emotion — there’s no question — but we need to make sure that we don’t get emotional in the arena. That’s the first part.

“Two is playing with a real sense of confidence and belief in who we are, in our style of play. We know this is a heck of a challenge. 

“Last year in the fourth quarter, we were behind in that game [at Alabama]. Then we ended up scoring 21 points and we ended up finishing that game on a seven-minute drive to close the game out, so stay in the course, keeping our poise, keeping our composure, having a real sense of belief, playing as one, as a team, and pulling for one another.”

In the four-team College Football Playoff era, the loser of a game like Michigan-Texas would have little chance of making the field at the end of the season (though Alabama did earn a bid after losing to the Longhorns in 2023). In the new 12-team era, this is nowhere near an elimination game.

“Because of the new format, I like this matchup even more because I think this is why you come to a Texas or you go to a Michigan, is to play in games like this,” Sarkisian said. “Our guys love this opportunity, and I’m sure their players do, too, and I think the coaches do as well — that we get to go play in a marquee game, on the road, in a great environment for college football. And in a couple years we get to do it here with them as well.

“On the same token, if you win this game, it’s great. If you don’t, it isn’t going to kill you.”

Michigan is the winningest program in college football history with 1,005 victories, while Texas ranks tied for fourth with 948. Both teams have been playing since the 1800s, and Sarkisian is excited to see the two programs clash on the U-M campus.

“I’m super pumped,” the fourth-year Texas coach said. “I say this maybe for reporters or people watching that don’t know me: I love college football. Even as a kid, or watching Michigan play, them taking the field and all jumping up and hitting the ‘Go Blue’ sign, I love that.

“There are all these little things around college football with different teams, different stadiums that are the pageantry of the game. The Big House is one of those things. The Michigan helmets, them taking the field is one of those things.

“To think, these two iconic programs, with those iconic uniforms, and those iconic helmets meeting for the first time in The Big House, man, it’s awesome. I mean, I’m getting goosebumps right now, and we got five days to go, so it’s pretty special.”

Here are some more comments from Sarkisian heading into the Michigan game:

On Michigan’s defense

“First of all, I have a great deal of respect for Wink Martindale, their defensive coordinator. He and I worked together way back in 2004 with the Oakland Raiders. He’s a great defensive mind. He’s very creative. I think a lot of times people think, ‘Oh, they just blitz and they’re reckless’ or something. They’re not. There’s a method to all of the madness that they do.

“They’re very sound from a coverage standpoint. They’re a realy good defensive front with some elite players, but also some elite players on the back end, too.

“When you put together scheme with great players, and then they play with a great deal of confidence because of who they’ve been over the years, that’s the challenge. You just start thinking about all the great defenses that have ever come along the way. They got good schemes, they got good coaches, they got pride in that defensive style — but yet they’ve got some elite players. They’ve got first-round draft picks on that defense, too, so it’s a heck of a challenge for us.”

On if Michigan junior quarterback Alex Orji is similar to Alabama’s Jalen Milroe

“Very similar. This guy is a problem, because you have to treat him like a runner. He’s got size, he’s got speed, he can change the math on you quickly when you start adding him to the quarterback runs. But yet the arm talent is there to where he can affect you, especially down the field.

“If you remember in that game last year at ‘Bama, Milroe made a couple big-time throws down the field to create explosive plays. That’s something in this game for us that’s going to be critical.

“Yeah, clearly we gotta do great stopping the run — we need to be better at stopping the run than we were a week ago — but we surely don’t want to do that at the expense of giving up explosive plays in the pass game. That’s that fine line that we have to walk going into Saturday.”

On what the learning curve is for a first-time head coach considering Sherrone Moore is in his first season in the full-time role at Michigan

“I would say, one, he got great experience a year ago with the situation that they were in. To think as that season was going on, at the tail end of that season, every game that he was coaching in mattered. And thre were some big games. It wasn’t like they were cupcake games. He had to go into Penn State and win that game, he had to coach against Ohio State in that game. So he’s got great exposure, and he worked for a really good coach in Coach Harbaugh. 

“I don’t think probably for him that it feels new to him, just because of the experience that he got a year ago.”

On if Texas has been preparing for Michigan for months

“Our players didn’t know it probably until today, but we were practicing a lot of these plays for this game in training camp. They didn’t know it as much, but now they know it, that we’ve started the preparation for today. I don’t want to necessarily say it’s been in place for months, but we had a pretty good idea of the style in which we wanted to play this game, we’ve practiced a lot of these plays in training camp, and now we kinda get to dust them off this week and use them in the ball game.”

On being favored to beat Michigan and tuning out the noise

“Three-straight College Football Playoffs, national champs, 41-3 in their last 44 games and won 16 games in a row, they’ve won 23 straight at home. So we’re gonna be in for a dogfight.”