Texas Football’s Out-of-Conference Revival Under Steve Sarkisian

Many different factors plagued the Tom Herman era at Texas, leading to a not-so-ceremonious farewell of his position in favor of now head coach Steve Sarkisian. Herman overly recruited skill positions in lieu of the trenches. His play-calling, and decisions regarding who would be calling plays were often questioned, and a lack of a set-in-stone culture haunted his tenure until its end in 2020.

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Shadowed among larger-scale concerns of Herman’s time in Austin was an extremely lackluster record against Power 5 out-of-conference opponents. Between his first season in 2017 and his final season in 2020, Texas played five such regular-season games. His record in those matchups? 1-4.

It all started with the infamous home loss to Maryland in Herman’s first game at the helm, giving Maryland one of its just four wins in the 2017 season at DKR. Two games later, Herman’s team gave No. 4 USC a run for its money in the Coliseum, losing by just three to a Sam Darnold-led Trojan team.

Even with a win at home over the Trojans the next season, Texas still found a way to lose to the Terrapins once again in 2018, one of just four losses in a season where Texas finished in the top 10 of the AP Poll. Lastly, the Longhorns fell to one of the best teams of all time in 2019, playing within one score of the Burrow, Jefferson, and Chase LSU Tigers. Still, Herman had multiple chances to win that game and potentially kickstart a fantastic season in Austin but failed to execute late.

This wasn’t fully a Herman problem, either. Charlie Strong’s win over Notre Dame saved him from an 0-5 record in such games, and even the final season of Mack Brown’s tenure saw losses to BYU and Ole Miss.

This is to say that Texas was notably a relatively weak team against other Power 5 conferences in the 2010s, 4-10 in the decade, to be exact.

But that trend seems to be changing under head coach Steve Sarkisian. Though it didn’t start well against SEC opponents—losing at Arkansas and against Alabama in his first two seasons at the helm—Sarkisian is beginning to amass a repertoire for beating Power 5 opponents.

It started in 2023 with a program-defining win against Alabama. Sarkisian walked into Bryant-Denny Stadium and beat the best coach the sport has ever seen, with a team loaded with talent. Then, last season, Texas walked into the Big House and defeated the defending champions. Was it a different team from the year before? No question about it, but winning in Michigan is no easy task.

Sarkisian has gone 2-0 in major out-of-conference games in the last two seasons and was able to take down the ACC and Big 12 champions in the College Football Playoff last season. As Athletic Director Chris Del Conte continues to make it a priority to schedule tough out-of-conference matchups, Texas’ path to high seeding and eventual national championships will be built on the back of early-season wins for Sarkisian’s teams.

Now Texas stares directly down the barrel of what is likely its hardest out-of-conference task since the 2019 Tigers. The Longhorns will be traveling to Columbus, Ohio, again to face the defending national champions on the road. This time, though, Ohio State still has its head coach, will have a competent quarterback, and remains one of the best teams in the nation heading into 2025. It would not be a surprise to see this game as a battle between the No. 1 and No. 2 ranked teams heading into the year.

Texas may revert to its old ways with a loss in Columbus and eventually again when it hosts both the Wolverines and Buckeyes in Austin. Still, it seems like a historical trend of mediocrity might be turning itself around. The Strong and Herman eras brought countless heartbreaking losses before Big 12 play had even started. Now, at least in the past two years, Texas has played exciting and meaningful games before the start of conference play and has come out on top both times.

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Winning in Columbus would be another milestone in Sarkisian’s tenure, ridding the monkey off the back of previous head coaches who have had to travel to hostile environments in different parts of the country. Though there will be a lot of football left to play in the season, a win in Columbus would feel like a statement about what has been built in Austin—and that the 2025 Texas team has every chance in the world to become champions.