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Steve Sarkisian breaks down Texas plays on 'Read & React'

Eric Nahlinby:Eric Nahlin•11/07/24
Ryan Wingo
Ryan Wingo (Will Gallagher/Inside Texas)

Earlier this week, Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian joined Read & React hosts Cole Cubelic and Roman Harper to talk ball on the SEC Network. We often get to hear Sark speak, but with the departure of the Longhorn Network, we rarely get to hear him break down plays as he did on Rewind.

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The hosts took the opportunity to show a handful of Texas plays this season that highlight different aspects of the offense. Sark followed up on each play with more color.

The video is below.

1. Arch Manning “sweeping the field” to find his fourth progression (4:10 in the video)

This resulted in a 3rd and 9 completion to Ryan Niblett for a first down inside ULM’s 5-yard line.

The play illustrates Isaiah Bond as the primary but he’s doubled. Manning scans from left to right to see his post options covered. He settles on Niblett who has Gunnar Helm leaked out as a lead blocker.

“We are definitely a progression based offense,” said Sark, before going into greater depth about how their approach has evolved.

“There was a time and place when we were kind of cut the field in half, one-high, two-high read stuff. The defenses have gotten so complicated, I mean half the time I can’t tell if it’s quarters coverage or weak buzz with the boundary safety. We’ve gotten more into the progression stuff and this allows us to, like I said, sweep the board, get through the progression, but also not just throw a swing route with a flat defender there to tackle a guy — have a blocker there to kind of start the play see if we can create an explosive.”

2. Isolation play to Matthew Golden against Georgia (7:10 in the video)

As Texas fans well know, Georgia was able to cause a lot of havoc in the passing game with pressure. On this play, Sark uses max protect with a two-man route combination.

Sark discusses how he uses “reverse motioning” made popular by Miami Dolphins head coach Mike McDaniel to get Golden one on one with the Georgia corner. “Georgia’s famous for getting double coverage and bracket coverage.” On this play, Golden is easily able to exploit the coverage for 29-yard gain.

3. Condensed formation aids Ryan Wingo‘s reverse against OU (8:45 in the video)

Texas is in a condensed formation with three receivers to the field with Wingo as the lone receiver to the short side of the field.

Sark said, “I do think condensing splits helps you get some blocking angles for your receivers, especially on safeties and DB’s. It allows you when you do play-action pass to maybe get some routes kind of crossing the field. But for us we do like to run the reverses on some of our action….”

Sark points out how Golden threw a block that helped spring Wingo for a big gain.

The whole video is worth your time but if you’re into the nuts and bolts of it you can skip ahead to the first play.

At 12:15 of the video the panel discusses Texas’ upcoming game against the Florida Gators. Sark understands that even with Florida’s injuries on offense the Gators are still going to play great defense. He mentions Florida’s effort last week against Georgia.

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All in all, it’s a pretty informative appearance from Sark.

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