OTF Premium Texas dealing with growing pains while striving to play to a championship standard

[Jeff Howe]

AUSTIN, Texas — When the dust settled on last Saturday’s 38-7 win over San Jose State, Steve Sarkisian parked himself in front of a television at home with his son, Amayas, for the afternoon and evening slate of college football games.

Sarkisian's respite came after No. 7 Texas was assessed the second-highest number of single-game penalties (12) and yards (112) in his tenure. Even while achieving a 31-point margin of victory over the Spartans, the Longhorns fell short of their championship standard.

Texas struggled at times to get out of its way at the same time as No. 2 Penn State was making a 34-0 win over FIU “harder than it needed to be in a lot of areas,” coach James Franklin said afterward.

“Get better” was Georgia’s message after the Bulldogs slugged through a 90-plus-minute weather delay in a 28-6 win over Austin Peay.

Clemson trailed Troy at home, 7-0, when play was stopped due to the weather. The Tigers rallied for a 27-16 victory, avoiding what would’ve been a disastrous 0-2 start to a season that coach Dabo Swinney’s team entered with sky-high expectations.

“This group really hadn’t had the rat poison,” Swinney said on Monday. The two-time national championship-winning coach put his own twist on a metaphor made famous by Bill Parcells and Nick Saban to summarize his team's struggles.

“They’ve just had the ‘you suck’ poison.

The Tigers’ only loss remains a 17-10 defeat at the hands of LSU in the season opener. The Bayou Bengals dealt with their own issues in Week 2, winning a 23-7 decision over Louisiana Tech, after which coach Brian Kelly saying he wasn't “happy with the production across the board.”

The issues in State College, Athens, Clemson and Baton Rouge don’t absolve the Longhorns from the mistakes they must fix in their two remaining non-conference games before opening SEC play in the Swamp against Florida on Oct. 4. Still, it can’t hurt Sarkisian, his coaches or his players to know that they’re not the only highly-ranked team dealing with varying degrees of issues through two games.

“You think, 'Is this just us? Are we screwed up?' Well, some pretty good teams were struggling,” Sarkisian said. “There were some other teams that looked really good. Maybe they're a little ahead of the curve? I don't know.

“I just trust in our process of getting our guys ready to go."

Even though Trevor Goosby and Arch Manning were among the talented prospects waiting in the wings to move up the depth chart into more significant roles in 2025, Texas only returned 40 percent of its offensive production from a 13-win, College Football Playoff semifinalist. ESPN’s Bill Connelly ranked the Longhorn offense No. 103 nationally in returning production, which contributed to Texas ranking No. 81 in overall returning experience.

The multi-year impact of the transfer portal and the expiration of pandemic-related eligibility extensions made the conditions ripe for inexperience to be a significant problem across college football. According to Connelly, the national average for returning overall experience at the FBS level has declined every season from a 76.7% mark in 2021 down to a 53.2% national average in 2025 (with 51 percent of the production back from 2024, the Longhorns are below the national average).

The lack of experience, even for one of the most talented rosters in the country, could explain why adjectives like 'sloppy' and 'undisciplined' accurately describe the product Texas has put on the field through two games. It could also be the root the Longhorns, as Sarkisian put it on Monday, giving in to human nature and failing to show up with the required levels of mental intensity and focus for the San Jose State game.

“You come off a really big game on the road for your season opener and human nature is, 'Let's take a deep breath and relax.' We don't get to relax,” Sarkisian said. “Our mental intensity needs to be as high as it needs to be. We need to play with the right type of discipline throughout the week — on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. That discipline is what's going to lead to the proper habits of how we practice, which, ultimately, will lead to the consistency in our play, which will lead to the growth that all of us need to make."

The process of showing up every day with the right frame of mind, Sarkisian said, starts with him and the coaches, a group dealing with their own growing pains. Sarkisian’s Texas staff wouldn’t be the first to miscalculate the issues inexperience can create after coaching clubs chock-full of talented veterans to the doorstep of the national championship game each of the last two seasons.

If the Longhorns want to find out whether or not the third time is the charm, things need to come together sooner rather than later and result in a cleaner, more detail-oriented product on the field. For that to happen, Texas must show for Saturday’s game against UTEP (3:15 p.m., SEC Network) more prepared to play to its lofty internal standard compared to how it handled last weekend's home opener.

“Our standard is the only scoreboard that matters,” Sarkisian said. “We've got to play to our standard. The scoreboard up there will take care of itself.”

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[Joe Zura]

Great stuff jefe 🤘🤘🏼

[drag worm]

“You think, 'Is this just us? Are we screwed up?'
 

So telling about how he feels so far. 
 

 

[Tuco Ramirez]

Great article Jeff! I don’t expect a clean performance this weekend, but I’m hoping to see notable improvement across the board especially with penalties. 

[Dread-headed Texan]

During the Quinn years, I never had the confidence we had the roster to win a championship. I did believe we were talented, but I felt there were teams we didn't match up well against. This year I have that confidence in the roster, that doesn't mean I think they will win it all just that they can. There are some things I need to see to shore up that confidence, but I realize this is a young team and there will be ups and downs. So buckle up buttercups 🤣 it's going to be a wild, bumpy ride🤘🏿

[UT92]

Speaking of growing pains, I'm going to go a bit off character and ask a question for thought that I know could illicit some "stop over-reacting" comments. It's not a criticism of Sark, or Arch, or how the offense has looked the last couple of games, but rather something that I started pondering after thinking about how other teams have won or played for championships lately.

Sarks QB strategy is clearly to recruit a HS QB he likes every year and develop them. Hopefully for a year or two before they have to start. Is this the smartest way to go? 

The Pros: Before a QB has to start a game, they have had a year or two to sit and learn Sark's complicated offense. It's also likely to be more sustainable and build more depth than relying on transfers.

The Cons: Inevitably, even if a 5 star prospect has spent a couple of years learning the system, at some point you are going to be relying on a QB with little to no game experience to start. There are growing pains for at least the early part of the season. Also, you can project what a HS QB could develop into in college, but you don't really know until they are on the field. Some are just misses (Weigman, Arnold, Nelson, Uiagalelei  are just a few of the 5 stars lately that didn't exactly flourish at their initial destination)

Both teams that played in the national championship game last year did so with portal QBs. Oregon has been a top 5 team the last 3 years with Nix and then Gabriel, and looks to be very good again this year with Moore. OU is unfortunately looking better than I would like with Mateer. 

I have always liked Sark's recruit and develop the best HS QB strategy (Quinn wasn't a traditional experienced portal transfer), but I can see what some teams are preferring to take the route of bringing in a proven transfer each season and trying to avoid the inevitable growing pains of a first-year starter.

 

[harveycmd]

Many of the top ranked teams have inexperienced QBs this season. Ohio State, Oregon, Georgia and Notre Dame all chose to go with a QB who was developing on their roster last year but didn't really play much. I'm sure some of it came down to QBs available in the portal. Many of those teams had portal QBs last year that were fifth and sixth year players. Not available now.

[alrightalrightalright]

Great article, Jeff! Improve week over week. Let’s enjoy the journey

[Bobby Burton]

Good read! Thanks, Jeff. 

[SuperDave0805]

The portal makes it likely we never see teams hitting on all cylinders early in seasons again 

[FortyAcresFB]

Sark is going to have some growing pains this year with such a young roster. I blame the media for using the Arch hype train to prop up expectations for this team where people are impatient that we don’t look like national championship contenders right away.

I’m one to think Sark is really keeping it pretty vanilla with his offense until SEC play and letting the guys get reps in. Still need to see a week-to-week improvement making sure we are on the right track.

[horns96]

12 minutes ago, FortyAcresFB said:

Sark is going to have some growing pains this year with such a young roster. I blame the media for using the Arch hype train to prop up expectations for this team where people are impatient that we don’t look like national championship contenders right away.

I’m one to think Sark is really keeping it pretty vanilla with his offense until SEC play and letting the guys get reps in. Still need to see a week-to-week improvement making sure we are on the right track.

Can remember back in 2001 when it was "Greg's holding back for OU".  

[Jarveaux]

Our first SEC game Florida The Texas Longhorns will come out like the Green Bay Packers. In the 1960’s . No worries. Be Happy!

[Gussy Fink-Nottle]

2 hours ago, horns96 said:

Can remember back in 2001 when it was "Greg's holding back for OU".  

Yep, missing open guys and committing penalties isn’t really “holding back”. 

[SuperDave0805]

Texas Volleyball wins another 5 set thriller 

[Sasquatch3027]

Another great write up Jeff. Was great meeting you in Houston a few weeks ago, and I love the work you put on the field! 

[AusMOJO]

7 hours ago, Dread-headed Texan said:

During the Quinn years, I never had the confidence we had the roster to win a championship. I did believe we were talented, but I felt there were teams we didn't match up well against. This year I have that confidence in the roster, that doesn't mean I think they will win it all just that they can. There are some things I need to see to shore up that confidence, but I realize this is a young team and there will be ups and downs. So buckle up buttercups 🤣 it's going to be a wild, bumpy ride🤘🏿

One thing I've learned is to stay out of the game threads. I've no problem with people reacting to stuff as it's happening, that is normal. But it personally does my head in lol. Now I just  watch the games and react afterwards. 

[AusMOJO]

11 hours ago, UT92 said:

Speaking of growing pains, I'm going to go a bit off character and ask a question for thought that I know could illicit some "stop over-reacting" comments. It's not a criticism of Sark, or Arch, or how the offense has looked the last couple of games, but rather something that I started pondering after thinking about how other teams have won or played for championships lately.

Sarks QB strategy is clearly to recruit a HS QB he likes every year and develop them. Hopefully for a year or two before they have to start. Is this the smartest way to go? 

The Pros: Before a QB has to start a game, they have had a year or two to sit and learn Sark's complicated offense. It's also likely to be more sustainable and build more depth than relying on transfers.

The Cons: Inevitably, even if a 5 star prospect has spent a couple of years learning the system, at some point you are going to be relying on a QB with little to no game experience to start. There are growing pains for at least the early part of the season. Also, you can project what a HS QB could develop into in college, but you don't really know until they are on the field. Some are just misses (Weigman, Arnold, Nelson, Uiagalelei  are just a few of the 5 stars lately that didn't exactly flourish at their initial destination)

Both teams that played in the national championship game last year did so with portal QBs. Oregon has been a top 5 team the last 3 years with Nix and then Gabriel, and looks to be very good again this year with Moore. OU is unfortunately looking better than I would like with Mateer. 

I have always liked Sark's recruit and develop the best HS QB strategy (Quinn wasn't a traditional experienced portal transfer), but I can see what some teams are preferring to take the route of bringing in a proven transfer each season and trying to avoid the inevitable growing pains of a first-year starter.

 

The problem is, can you rely on a portal transfer at QB all the time? What happens when the guy you get doesn't work out or gets injured? I can see the pro's of it but the cons are also there for that deal.

Mateer looks pretty good so far against sub-par teams. Even this years Michigan team looks worse than last years. Outside of Mateer they have nothing offensively and their OL isn't all that great. Even their D that was hyped up isn't that impressive. 

Anyway, it's a good conversation starter, that's for sure. 

[AusMOJO]

11 hours ago, harveycmd said:

Many of the top ranked teams have inexperienced QBs this season. Ohio State, Oregon, Georgia and Notre Dame all chose to go with a QB who was developing on their roster last year but didn't really play much. I'm sure some of it came down to QBs available in the portal. Many of those teams had portal QBs last year that were fifth and sixth year players. Not available now.

I truly think that it was Notre Dame that was trying to lure Ewers to come play there. Maybe he should've gone? Who knows, not sure he really fits their offensive style but what do I know? Could've been Oregon, he would fit that offense more than Notre Dame's, imo.