Running back Quintrevion Wisner, who rushed for a game-high 86 yards in a season-opening road loss to Ohio State, is dealing with a leg injury. Not wanting to “force the issue with him,” Sarkisian said, Wisner watched CJ Baxter Jr. (13 carries for 64 yards), Jerrick Gibson (seven carries for 38 yards) and Christian Clark (23 yards on four carries) lead the rushing attack from the sideline.

“I wanted Christian to play more; I wanted Jerrick to get opportunities,” Sarkisian said. “It worked out for us that way.”

The Longhorns were also without defensive tackle Alex January and wide receiver Emmett Mosley V, neither of whom dressed out for the game. OTF has learned that January’s injury absence could potentially extend into next Saturday’s home game against UTEP (3:15 p.m., SEC Network).

“Could we have pressed him into action or not? I know we've got a really deep defensive line room. Again, I think about the big picture here with a lot of these injuries, especially early in the season,” Sarkisian said regarding January’s status. “I think about the long road that we're hoping to go on, I think about the depth on our roster and I just don't feel like sometimes we have to press guys into action that aren't healthy enough, or that could further injure themselves. The idea was to hold him and then play some of these other guys, which we were able to do.”

During the game, DeAndre Moore Jr. appeared to catch an inadvertent fist to his head while being tackled after receiving a screen pass from Arch Manning, forcing him to leave the game early in the third quarter. Moore departed for the locker room after he was examined inside the sideline medical tent, but Sarkisian didn’t confirm the junior wide receiver’s injury after the game.

“I couldn't see it from where it occurred, but he definitely got dinged,” Sarkisian said. “We held him after that.”

Arch Manning threw for 295 yards and accounted for five touchdowns (four passing and one rushing), quarterbacking an offense that racked up 472 yards (7.3 yards per play). Parker Livingstone recorded the first 100-yard game of his young career (128 yards and two touchdowns on four receptions) and CJ Baxter Jr. (13 carries for 64 yards) paced the running game, which averaged 5.2 sack-adjusted yards per attempt (162 yards gained on 31 non-sack rushing attempts).

Pete Kwiatkowski’s defense forced four turnovers (two fumbles forced by Anthony Hill Jr., one forced by Ty’Anthony Smith and an interception by Jaylon Guilbeau), which the offense turned into 21 points. The Longhorns limited the Spartans to a combined 4-for-17 effort on third and fourth down (4-for-15 on third down) and held them under 100 yards on the ground (85 total, 2.9 yards per attempt).

With that said, the undisciplined, sloppy nature that clouded the 31-point margin of victory is best summarized by how the offense bookended the game.

DeAndre Moore Jr.’s 28-yard gain on a flip pass from Manning on the first play from scrimmage was negated because of a holding penalty. Jerrick Gibson fumbled at the end of a 6-yard gain in the closing seconds of the game, marking the offense’s second turnover near the red zone.

The toughest opponent Texas faced on Saturday was itself, and the Longhorns couldn’t get out of their way for long stretches of the game.

— There’s no way to sugarcoat 12 penalties for 115 yards. 

Whether the infractions were committed before or after the snap, Texas has proven itself to be a sloppy, undisciplined team eight quarters into the season. The Longhorns wanted to put a cleaner product on the field than what it showed against Ohio State, but the mission wasn’t accomplished on Saturday.

— Along with penalties, Texas must be better situationally.

Manning’s most egregious mistake of the game was trying to throw a ball away late in the first half, which was intercepted near the goal line. While Gibson’s fumble didn’t count as a turnover in the red zone, the Longhorns have scored three touchdowns on six red-zone possessions through two games.

Texas is now 7-for-26 on third down on the season. The offense was 2-for-12 on third down (average to-go distance of 9.7 yards), including 0-for-6 on third-and-9 or longer.

Manning’s interception, a situation in which he’ll hopefully take the sack and live to fight another down in the future, came with 38 seconds left in the second quarter. For the second time in as many games, the Longhorns failed to get points in a two-minute situation with the opponent set to receive the second-half kickoff.

— I usually don’t mind the aggressiveness to come after a punt, but in a scoreless game, and with an offense in desperate need of confidence, the 15-yard penalty Texas was assessed for roughing the punter brought the defense back on the field instead of the offense opening its third possession on the plus side of the field.

— Manning (19-for-30 throwing the football) had moments where he played with confidence, stood his ground in the pocket and delivered the ball where it needed to go. The redshirt sophomore was by no means perfect, but the chemistry he’s building with Livingstone and Jack Endries (52 yards and a touchdown on two receptions) can go a long way toward laying the 2025 passing game's foundation.

— Moore, who left the game with an undisclosed injury, and Ryan Wingo combined to catch eight balls for 60 yards on 12 targets. While Moore’s longest gain of the day was wiped out due to a penalty and Wingo dropped what could’ve been a long third-down conversion on a ball Manning put on the money, the attention Wingo drew on a post/corner combination route and Moore’s motion near the goal line opened windows on Livingstone’s two touchdown receptions.

— San Jose State’s tight defensive alignment made it tougher for Texas to run the ball than it should’ve been against a defense that was gashed on the ground by Central Michigan (236 yards allowed).

Still, it seemed like the Longhorn offensive line lacked a sense of urgency in the running game, and the Spartans won their share of one-on-one battles, which resulted in four tackles for loss and more pressure on Manning (six hurries) than expected. Saturday’s performance by the offensive line didn’t measure up to the effort in Columbus.

— After two games, the identity of the offense remains a mystery.

Going into the season, there was expected to be a shift away from the quick-game-heavy offense Quinn Ewers operated. The short game was largely a non-factor on Saturday, the intermediate game has been erratic and the offense hasn’t connected on enough vertical shots to lean on the deep ball.

The passing game is more of a work in progress than I expected it to be, even this early.

— For the most part, the defense seemed willing to let San Jose State run the football and connect on short passes.

Kwiatkowski’s plan to rely on a light box to defend the run while trying to limit yards after the catch got the job done. Nevertheless, I wouldn’t expect Texas to be as bland as it was on Saturday against the better offenses it’ll face in the SEC.

— Whether the Longhorns' miscues can be chalked up to growing pains or not, the most frustrating aspect regarding the seemingly endless series of self-inflicted wounds is what the on-field product looked like when Texas had everything clicking.

The Longhorns scored 28 points between the 4:10 mark of the first quarter and when there was 12:56 left on the clock in the second quarter, 21 of which came off turnovers. Unfortunately, the time surrounding the 7:14 blitzkrieg was riddled with mistakes that Texas must eliminate to be the type of team it wants to be by season’s end.

Sarkisian was addressing the Spartans, specifically his respect for Ken Niumatalolo as a coach. Aside from the kind words, Sarkisian wrapped up his opening statement by pointing out where the Longhorns' attention should be while building toward the SEC opener, on the road against No. 13 Florida on Oct. 4.

“Good challenge, good opportunity for us, but this week is really about us and what we do, and everybody in the organization being coachable and striving to get better this week,” Sarkisian said. “It's a lot of internal focus for us.”

How Texas gets the job done is more important than running San Jose State (0-1), which dropped a 16-14 decision at home to Central Michigan last Friday, out of Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium like a five-touchdown favorite should do. The team’s three remaining non-conference games are an opportunity to establish an identity, something that’s desperately needed on offense after a largely forgettable afternoon in Columbus.

It's imperative to fix the red zone issues. The Longhorns have scored just three touchdowns in 10 red-zone trips over their last four losses.

Still, execution inside the 20 isn’t the only area where the offense has to find itself before attempting to navigate an SEC schedule.

Texas was 5-for-14 on third down and 1-for-5 on fourth down against the Buckeyes. The Longhorns had a three-and-out in a two-minute situation before the end of the first half and ended a potential game-tying drive (with possession of the ball at their 15-yard line with 2:26 left in regulation) by turning the ball over on downs.

Sarkisian’s club will be left wanting against the more formidable opponents on the schedule if situational football continues to be executed with such ineptitude.

The more snaps Arch Manning logs running Sarkisian’s offense, the better the Longhorns can be. That’s if the two are on the same page, which means Manning has to execute and trust what Sarkisian dials up when playmaking opportunities arise. It's also on Sarkisian to have a better working knowledge of which portions of his call sheet will help Manning succeed situationally, especially how to most effectively start drives (the offense averaged 5.2 yards per play on first down in the loss to Ohio State, but the running game averaged 5.9 yards per attempt, while Manning was 6-for-13 through the air for 58 yards).

The Spartans averaged the third-most pass attempts per game in FBS last season (42.5). Their run-and-shoot style of offense should be conducive to Pete Kwiatkowski’s defense negatively impacting Walker Eget (24-for-43, 308 yards, two touchdowns and two interceptions in San Jose State’s opener) far more than how often Texas got to Julian Sayin, with the game plan put together by Ryan Day and Brian Hartline minimizing the risks taken by the redshirt freshman.

Even though Pro Football Focus only charged the Longhorns with two missed tackles in the opener, Sarkisian wants to see a more conservative effort from Texas defenders to force turnovers (the 2023 team’s loss to Oklahoma was the last game in which the Longhorn defense failed to record a takeaway before last week’s loss to the Buckeyes).

“I thought we played with really good effort, which didn't put us in a lot of one-on-one tackle situations. We had multiple white hats around the ball to get people on the ground,” Sarkisian said during his pregame Zoom call on Thursday. “That's going to be important in this game because the run-and-shoot creates space, and half of that offense is — get the completion, make the first guy miss in the open field. Owning our leverage, wrapping when we tackle — not just trying to knock people to the ground, but wrapping up — and then the second man coming in, attacking the football, I think, is going to be big as we continue to move forward.”

Although there’s no silver lining to the Ohio State loss, Texas knows exactly where it must improve with four weeks to go until the Longhorns head to the Swamp to tangle with the Gators. While Sarkisian’s club should travel to Gainesville with a 3-1 record in tow, how Texas approaches the next three games will go a long way toward determining how many notches the Longhorns will put in the win column when the level of competition picks back up.

“What do we do on Monday morning to get ourselves prepared for a ball game? What do we do to try to minimize players looking too far down the road and focus on the task at hand, of what's right in front of them?” Sarkisian said Thursday. “It's not so much about what anybody outside the building thinks or doesn't think, it's truly what I believe. I've been doing this long enough to know that human nature is human nature, and we can get caught in that trap, so sometimes you coach them harder. Sometimes you point out the slightest of details that could be off to make sure that the screws are tightened up really tight and that we're ready to play.”

Sarkisian’s film study confirmed that the Longhorns left too many yards, opportunities and points on the field at the Horseshoe to avenge their College Football Playoff semifinal loss to the Buckeyes in January.

A streak of 24 consecutive games forcing at least one turnover was snapped (a 34-30 loss to Oklahoma in 2023 was the last game in which the Texas defense failed to record a takeaway).

Three penalties charged to the defense (illegal hands to the face calls against Colin Simmons and Liona Lefau and a defensive holding call against Malik Muhammad) aided a touchdown drive and wiped out a safety, which put the Longhorns on the losing end of a nine-point swing.

Even with Jack Bouwmeester averaging 46.2 yards per punt, with three of his four punts pinning Ohio State inside its 10-yard line, Sarkisian said Texas must be better at playing complementary football, beginning with Saturday’s home opener against San Jose State (11 a.m., ABC).

“I thought in the first half we had some really good field position that we didn't capitalize on offensively, that the defense and special teams got us,” Sarkisian said. “Conversely, we had some good field position on defense.

“I just didn't think we did a good enough job of pinning them deep and flipping the field back in our favor.”

Obviously, the offense going 1-for-5 on fourth down, with two turnovers on downs occurring in the red zone, isn't conducive to winning games against elite-level competition. 

“We were aggressive initially, obviously, with the first fourth-down sneak, and then the fourth-and-2, which we didn't convert,” Sarkisian said. “A couple of the fourth downs late were, kind of, because of the situation, we, kind of, had to go for them. They were what they were.”

On the other side of the coin, Sarkisian liked his team’s fight.

The offense “played much better in the second half,” he said. Arch Manning and the Longhorns tallied 257 total yards on 41 plays from scrimmage (6.3 yards per play) and recorded six of their seven explosive plays (four pass completions of 15 yards or more and two rushing attempts of 10 yards or more).

He came away pleased with what Texas generated on the ground (166 yards on 37 official rushing attempts). With Quintrevion Wisner (16 carries for 80 yards) and C.J. Baxter (10 carries for 40 yards) leading the way, the Longhorns averaged 4.5 yards per rushing attempt as a team (the Buckeyes allowed 4.5 or more yards per carry in just three of their previous 29 games, a stretch in which the Ohio State defense held opponents to under 100 yards rushing).

“I think our ability to run the football was evident in the game,” Sarkisian said. “To go into that environment against that defense, to rush for just about 170 yards, I thought, was good for us.”

Pete Kwiatkowski’s defense held the Buckeyes to 3.8 yards per play, 2.3 yards per rushing attempt, a 3-for-12 effort on third down and just two explosive plays (a 16-yard reception by Jeremiah Smith and Julian Sayin’s 40-yard touchdown pass to Carnell Tate) on 54 snaps.

“I thought, defensively, we played a very good football game,” Sarkisian said.

Individually, Sarkisian singled out a few Longhorns for their performances in all three phases.

“I was proud and happy for Cedric Baxter. I think he had 15 touches in the game, his first game back not playing for a year — 10 rushes, five receptions,” Sarkisian said. “I thought Manny Muhammad competed his tail off Saturday against a great player in Jeremiah Smith. I thought Jack Bouwmeester was fantastic. He's a weapon for us in the punt game. I thought to have four [new] full-time starters on the offensive line [Trevor Goosby, Connor Stroh, Cole Hutson and Brandon Baker], and the way that they performed was definitely encouraging. I think Arch, in the second half, I thought we started to see the glimpses of what he's capable of.

Sarkisian wrapped up his thoughts on the loss to the Buckeyes before fielding questions on Monday with a message befitting a coach and a team looking to turn the page after learning a lot about themselves.

“A lot to look forward to this season, I think, of where this team can go,” he added. “We've got a ton of potential. Now, we've got to make that come to life.”

Instead, the Longhorns suffered a 14-7 loss because some of the same critical issues that had plagued them last season resurfaced in a big way in Columbus on Saturday.

— It starts with penalties.

The totality of six accepted penalties for 50 yards was less than what Texas averaged in its three losses last season (eight accepted penalties for an average of 63 yards per game). Still, they accounted for some of the most critical plays in the game.

It’s hard to put any level of blame for the loss on the defense. Pete Kwiatkowski’s unit did everything it could to keep the Longhorns in the game.

Regardless, a hands-to-the-face penalty against Colin Simmons wiped out a third-down stop on an eventual Ohio State touchdown drive. The same penalty levied against Liona Lefau negated what would’ve been a safety (the call offset a holding call against Ohio State in the end zone).

Pre-snap penalties stunted the offense’s progress in the first half.

— The Longhorns pressured Julian Sayin (13-for-20, 126 yards and a touchdown), getting him off the spot and speeding him up on critical downs. The pass rush never got home, though, which was a credit to Ryan Day and Brian Hartline for dialing up easy throws for Sayin and positioning him so that he could throw the ball away without putting it in harm’s way.

The Texas defense was tremendous, even if it couldn’t force the negative play it needed to create to flip the game.

— Arch Manning’s legs limited the few negative plays the Buckeyes created, but, overall, the offensive line did a solid job in pass protection (Ohio State finished the game with one sack and one tackle for loss). Including the lone negative play (and a no-gainer, when Manning got back to the line of scrimmage on a scramble), the Longhorns ran the ball for 166 yards and averaged 4.5 yards per attempt.

I felt going into the game that if Manning (10 carries for 38 yards) had more than eight official rushing attempts, it wouldn’t be good for the offense. It wasn’t good because…

— Texas still doesn’t have an identity in the red zone. It’s easy to be disappointed when the play-caller doesn’t dial up the touchdown play, but I didn't like Sarkisian’s sequencing near the goal line, especially his decisions on second down.

On the first failed goal-to-go situation, he called a between-the-tackles run for Manning that was stuffed for a 1-yard gain after CJ Baxter (10 carries for 40 yards) ran for five yards on first-and-goal from the 9-yard line.

— I’m accusing Sarkisian of something I used to fault Tom Herman for, which is putting an arrogant game plan into motion. The game Sarkisian called in the first half lacked creativity, with Sarkisian seeming willing to let his squad play the Buckeyes straight-up to see where they stood.

Things got better in the second half (257 total yards and 6.3 yards per play after halftime). Ohio State also deserves credit for causing some of the issues (Arvell Reese, who finished the game with nine tackles, a sack and a tackle for loss, might’ve been the best player on the field for the Buckeyes).

With that said, it was the most unimaginative, uninspiring game plan I can remember seeing from Sarkisian.

— Even when Sarkisian’s call was the right one, the offense (more often than not) suffered from Manning (17-for-30, 170 yards, a touchdown and an interception) missing throws or wide receivers failing to catch the ball. I don’t know if Manning had happy feet, felt panicked/rushed or couldn’t anticipate where to go with the ball, but the passing game never clicked.

— I’m handing out defensive game balls for this one to Lefau (nine tackles and a tackle for loss), Graceson Littleton (credited with one tackle and a pass breakup, but his presence was tremendous in his debut), Malik Muhammad (six tackles and a nice pass breakup in coverage against Jeremiah Smith, who had six catches for 43 yards, but never took over the game), Ty’Anthony Smith (a nice open-field tackle against Smith to force a Buckeye punt late in the first half) and the interior defensive line (Alex January, Maraad Watson and Cole Brevard had their moments). On offense, here’s to noteworthy performances by Baxter (a tremendous blitz pickup on a first-down throw from Manning to Parker Livingstone), Livingstone (a nice contested catch for the offense’s only touchdown), Jack Endries (who turned six targets into four receptions for 50 yards) and Quintrevion Wisner (a game-high 80 yards on 16 carries).

— Texas won’t play a team with a pulse until Florida in Gainesville on Oct. 4. Still, I want to see how Manning, Sarkisian and the Longhorns respond and grow in the remaining three non-conference games before the Sept. 27 open date.

The reaction from national pundits and opposing fans is and will continue to be visceral. The No. 1 team in the country face-planted on a massive stage to open the season, and, given Manning’s performance and Sarkisian’s 2-12 record as a head coach against top-five opponents (1-6 record at Texas), the Longhorns won’t feel the love until they put a better product on the field against a quality foe.

What Sarkisian said about Manning in his postgame press conference applies to the 2025 squad and where it goes from here: “The expectations were out of control on the outside, but I’d say let’s finish the book before we judge it. This is one chapter, and we have a long season to play."

“If we don’t stop the run and run the ball,” the Buckeyes’ coach said when asked about the importance of success in the trenches, “we’re not going to win the game.”

Under Steve Sarkisian, the Longhorns are 33-4 when winning the rushing yardage battle. Since the start of the 2021 season, Texas has held an opponent under 100 net rushing yards in 19 games, winning 18 of them (last season’s College Football Playoff semifinal loss to Ohio State in the Cotton Bowl is the only loss).

While using a variety of formations and pre-snap movements to create mismatches in the passing game separates Sarkisian’s offense from other attacks, it’s much more potent when the Longhorns can run the football.

If the defense remains stout against the run, the offense doesn’t need to pile up rushing yards to be successful (only four of the team’s 13 wins last season saw Texas rush for 200 or more yards). Still, the ground attack can’t falter the way it did in the Longhorns’ losses last season, three games in which Texas averaged a paltry 39.3 yards per game and a forgettable 1.4 yards per attempt.

When adjusting the yardage totals to exclude sacks, Texas still only rushed for 231 yards on 61 attempts in its losses. Averaging 77 yards per game and 3.4 yards per attempt didn’t cut the mustard for an offense that netted 186.3 rushing yards per game and ran the football at a 4.8-yard-per-game clip in 13 victories (even with a 30-carry, 53-yard outing in the Peach Bowl win over Arizona State counting toward the production).

The Longhorns failed to reach 30 official rushing attempts in last season’s losses, including the loss to the Buckeyes (58 yards on 29 carries). Still, a sack-adjusted 85-yard effort on 25 carries (3.4 yards per attempt) positioned Texas to reach the national championship game.

Such production (as long as the re-tooled offensive line can create enough room for C.J. Baxter, Quintrevion Wisner and the other running backs to operate, Sarkisian stays patient, content to let his offense work over the Ohio State defense with a series of body blows throughout the bout) can get it off on the right foot in the first step of the 2025 squad’s quest to ascend to the top of the mountain.

The teleconference is a much tighter window than Sarkisian’s Monday press conference or his Thursday Zoom call (his portion of the call lasted less than six minutes). Still, Sarkisian’s comments on Wednesday addressed a few key topics ahead of No. 1 Texas opening the 2025 season on Saturday against No. 3 Ohio State (11 a.m., Fox).

— When asked if Emmett Mosley V will be available for Saturday’s game, Sarkisian said the Stanford wide receiver transfer is “limited this week.” He didn’t elaborate further.

Presumably, the first three wideouts to see the field against the Buckeyes will be DeAndre Moore Jr., Ryan Wingo and Parker Livingstone. If Mosley doesn’t play, the wide receiver rotation will be filled out by players the staff trusts.

“At the end of the day, it's not about ability; it's what you're able to do,” Sarkisian said. “What you're able to do is what ultimately you show us, and then if you can do it consistently, that earns our trust. When you have our trust, we're going to play you."

— What is Sarkisian hoping to learn about his team inside the Horseshoe against the Buckeyes?

“Everything,” he said. “It's a new team. New people doing new things. New roles, new responsibilities. Everybody's had to elevate their game from last year to the next, whether it's a third-year player to a senior player, a second-year player to a third-year player, from a special teams guy playing more on offense or defense, from kids who were in high school now playing for us in college. I'm curious about it all. It's going to be fun to get answers to a lot of things that we have questions about, which, quite frankly, is just about everything.”

— This isn’t the first time in Sarkisian’s career as a head coach when he’s had to open a season against the opponent his team played to end the previous season. Washington’s 2012 season ended with a 28-26 loss to No. 20 Boise State in the Las Vegas Bowl, but Sarkisian’s fifth campaign in 2013 started with the Huskies welcoming the Broncos to Seattle, a game Washington won convincingly, 38-6.

Sarkisian’s Huskies also avenged a 56-21 loss to No. 8 Nebraska in the third game of the 2010 season with a 19-7 win over 17th-ranked Huskers in the Holiday Bowl, which wrapped up his second season at Washington with the program’s first winning record (7-6) in eight years.

For Sarkisian, going 232 days between meetings with a non-conference opponent, even one as talented as the reigning national champions, isn’t foreign.

“Part of it is, schematically, how much are people really going to change? Names and faces, some of them can remain the same. Some of them are new. How do people evolve and grow in their roles — some of the returning faces? There's challenges to it all,” Sarkisian said. “I think, at the end of the day, there's some commonalities, I'm sure, that they'll be, that they do. There'll be some new things. Maybe they move some pieces around, some people in different spots. What do they do with Jeremiah [Smith]? Do they use them the same way? Do they use him differently? Do they use them on punt returns? Do they use him on kick returns? How much did they do with Caleb Downs? Sonny Styles? A lot of similar names from last year, it's just, how much do they evolve? Then, how much have we evolved with some of the people in our organization and some of the schemes? That's part of the process of [a season opener]. That's always one of the challenges of Game 1 is the unknowns, and then trying to put your players in the best position to have some success.”

After traveling to Boone Pickens Stadium and dropping a 41-34 decision to No. 11 Oklahoma State on Oct. 22, 2022, Sarkisian’s road record as coach of the Longhorns stood at an abysmal 1-6. While Bijan Robinson churning out 216 yards on a career-high 35 carries in a win over TCU in Fort Worth accounted for Sarkisian’s only victory through his first six true road games on the job, things haven’t been the same since the loss in Stillwater.

That’s the last time Texas lost a true road game, establishing the longest active road winning streak in the country after last season’s 17-7 win over No. 20 Texas A&M at Kyle Field. Winners in each of their last 11 true road games, the No. 1 Longhorns try to make it 12 consecutive victories next Saturday when they open the 2025 season against No. 3 Ohio State.

Traveling to the Horseshoe to face the reigning national champion for the second time in less than eight months might make for the toughest road trip of Sarkisian’s tenure. That’s saying a lot, considering the Aggies became the fifth Associated Press Top 25 opponent to fall victim to Texas during the streak.

The streak started with a turning point in Sarkisian’s time leading the program — a 34-27 win over No. 13 Kansas State on Nov. 5, 2022.

With the Wildcats on the verge of forcing overtime, and the Longhorns on the verge of blowing a 21-point halftime lead, Keondre Coburn stripped a scrambling Adrian Martinez. Jaylan Ford secured the loose ball and the victory for Texas, its first under Sarkisian away from Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium over an AP Top 25 opponent.

Since then, the Longhorns have snapped Alabama’s 21-game winning streak at Bryant-Denny Stadium in 2023 and Michigan’s 23-game winning streak at the Big House last season. A 27-24 win over No. 25 Vanderbilt was one of three ranked opponents Texas defeated on the road en route to a 13-win season and a second consecutive trip to the College Football Playoff in 2024.

The key to changing the program’s fortunes when traveling into enemy territory, Sarkisian said after the team’s second camp scrimmage last Saturday, was sticking to the routine he established in 2021.

“I don't know that there's some secret sauce. We're a routine operation," Sarkisian said. "As much as some of us wanted us to change our routine on the road, we stuck with it way back in the day when we weren't a great road team. Over time, guys found the routine of what we did and why we did what we did.

“We started to change the narrative of who we were as a road team.”

The current road winning streak is tied for the program’s fourth-longest in the AP Poll era (since 1936). No Texas had ever racked up double-digit consecutive road wins until Darrell Royal’s Longhorns won 10 in a row, beginning with a 27-12 victory over Baylor on Nov. 10, 1962, and ending with a 27-24 loss to No. 3 Arkansas on Oct. 16, 1965.

Sarkisian’s current streak is tied with a stretch of road success Texas enjoyed under Mack Brown over three seasons (2000-02). After a 28-14 win over Colorado in Boulder on Oct. 14, 2000, the Longhorns didn’t drop another road game until a 42-38 loss to Texas Tech on Nov. 16, 2002, which kept Texas out of the Big 12 title game.

Sarkisian has the Longhorns positioned similarly to where Brown had them in the early 2000s. Back then, Texas was stacking elite recruiting classes on top of each other and had been close to playing for a national championship, with a loss to Colorado in the 2001 Big 12 Championship Game costing the Longhorns an opportunity to face Miami in the Rose Bowl.

Whether Texas continues the winning streak inside the Horseshoe in nine days or not, double-digit winning streaks in true road games have only happened when the Longhorns have been legitimate championship contenders.

— Royal’s Wishbone-era squad won 12 true road games in a row as part of the program’s record-setting 30-game winning streak (1968-70).

The ‘68 Longhorns bounced back with a vengeance from a 1-1-1 start, working out the kinks in the Wishbone while getting through Oklahoma State, Oklahoma and No. 9 Arkansas before a 38-14 road win over Rice on Oct. 26. Texas, which won two national championships before its school-record winning streak was snapped with a 24-11 loss to Notre Dame in the Cotton Bowl at the end of the 1970 season, saw the road winning streak end at the hands of No. 16 Arkansas in Little Rock, 31-7, on Oct. 16, 1971.

— Fred Akers came painfully close to winning a couple of national championships in his time as the Longhorns’ head man (1977-86). At the height of his tenure, Akers led Texas to 13 consecutive true road wins, which were spread out over four seasons (1981-84).

A week after the Longhorns took a No. 1 ranking into Fayetteville and ran into a Razorback buzz, dropping a 42-11 decision, they went into Irving’s Texas Stadium and handed No. 10 SMU its only loss of the 1981 season, recording a 9-7 win. The Mustangs were one of four ranked opponents to drop a home game to Texas during the streak, with two of the ranked wins coming in 1983 (No. 5 Auburn and No. 9 SMU) and another in 1984 (No. 12 TCU).

The 44-23 win over the Horned Frogs on Nov. 17, 1984, was the last win during the streak, with a loss to Baylor in Waco ending it a week later (24-10 on Nov. 24).

— After Brown’s ‘02 squad lost to Texas Tech, the Longhorns rattled off 15 true road victories in a row over the next four seasons (2003-06), three of which came over ranked opponents.

Texas knocked off Arkansas in Fayetteville (2004) and won twice in College Station (2003 and 2005) and Lubbock (2004 and 2006) during the streak. Sandwiched between a 55-16 thrashing of No. 21 Oklahoma State (Nov. 8, 2003 in Stillwater) and a 22-20 triumph over No. 17 Nebraska in the snow (Oct. 21, 2006 in Lincoln) was a 25-22 win in the Horseshoe over No. 4 Ohio State on Sept. 10, 2005, which established the Longhorns as a legitimate national championship contender early in a season that ended with Texas snapping the school's 35-year title drought.

“I purposely went after him with a couple of different things,” Sarkisian said after the scrimmage. “For him to play the way that he played gave me more confidence than I've had, and I have a lot in him. Today was very, very encouraging on that front.”

Muhammad, a veteran cornerback with 18 starts in 30 career games, will begin the 2025 season with arguably the toughest assignment he’ll face as a junior whenever he has to cover Ohio State’s Jeremiah Smith. Smith was limited to one reception for three yards on Jan. 10, when the Buckeyes’ 28-14 triumph in the Cotton Bowl ended the Longhorns’ season one game shy of the College Football Playoff National Championship.

“It was a team effort,” Muhammad said earlier in camp about what it took for Texas to hold Smith to his lowest statistical output and his lowest single-game grade from Pro Football Focus during his remarkable true freshman season.

The Longhorns had Smith’s number in Arlington. Still, Sarkisian, who didn’t mention Smith or any other Ohio State wide receivers by name while detailing what Muhammad went through last week, knows coach Ryan Day and offensive coordinator Brian Hartline will be looking to get the 6-foot-3-inch, 223-pound Smith (76 receptions 1,315 yards and 15 touchdowns, which established new freshman records for a Buckeye) involved early and often.

The occasions when Muhammad finds himself one-on-one with Smith should be few and far between.

That’s not a knock on the 6-foot, 188-pound Muhammad, who Pro Football Focus touts as the sixth-best returning cornerback in the country. Texas should do whatever it takes to limit the times Smith faces man coverage because he destroyed opponents in those situations last season.

According to PFF, Smith’s 90.6 grade against man coverage was second among FBS wide receivers (minimum of 13 targets), recording 25 receptions for 384 yards and four touchdowns on 32 targets with a near-perfect NFL passer rating when targeted (156.3). Smith also averaged 4.09 yards per route run (sixth in FBS) with an average depth of target of 11.1 yards, indicating that if Will Howard could correctly identify that Smith was facing man coverage, the nation’s No. 1-ranked recruit in 2024 would be turned loose, and Ohio State could hunt chunk-yardage plays (Smith caught 12 passes last season that traveled 20 yards or more down the field, racking up 467 yards and scoring four touchdowns, recording a near-perfect PFF grade of 99.9 when targeted on deep throws).

Julian Sayin, who was named Ohio State’s starting quarterback on Monday, shouldn’t be expected to decipher what Pete Kwiatkowski is throwing at him in his first career start. Nevertheless, it remains to be seen how much Kwiatkowski and Duane Akina alternate between playing man and zone in the opener.

That has more to do with trusting the communication that the secondary has worked to rebuild in the wake of losing Jahdae Barron and Andrew Mukuba than anything else. At the same time, an effective pass rush could make life on the back end much more manageable if the Longhorns can routinely pressure Sayin.

Although Smith was good last season against zone, catching 43 passes for 783 yards and nine touchdowns, shading coverage to his side of the field and devoting more resources to him, in general, is the path of least resistance.

Elevated to the No. 2 wide receiver, with Emeka Egbuka out of eligibility, Carnell Tate was much better against zone last season (a season-long PFF grade of 73.7) than when working against man coverage (59.1). While it’s risky for Texas to let its defensive backs handle Tate, Brandon Inniss and the other Buckeye receiving threats more often in one-on-one situations, Muhammad and the other Longhorn defensive backs should be ready for what they’ll see inside the Horseshoe in 12 days.

Still, through six practices, Sarkisian knew enough to make a definitive statement about Kenny Baker’s unit.

“We're deep,” Sarkisian said after the team's Aug. 5 practice. “That's probably the biggest thing I can say about that group right now. We're playing a lot of guys, which has been good.”

Vernon Broughton and Alfred Collins were two of the first 71 picks in the 2025 NFL Draft. Along with losing two of the most prominent members of a Texas defense that was No. 3 in FBS in total defense (283.4 yards per game and 4.4 yards per play allowed), scoring defense (15.3 points per game allowed) in the red zone (62.9 percent conversion rate allowed), the expired eligibility of Jermayne Lole and Bill Norton put the Longhorns in a position in which the 94 snaps Alex January logged as a true freshman made him the team's most experienced returning tackle.

Cole Brevard (Purdue), Hero Kanu (Ohio State) and Travis Shaw (North Carolina) joined the program out of the transfer portal during the winter window. Even with January and Melvin Hills III back with a year under their belts, and Myron Charles, Justus Terry and Josiah Sharma making up a strong signing class that was on campus for spring practice, Texas went back into the portal and snagged Lavon Johnson (Maryland) and Maraad Watson (Syracuse) heading into the summer.

Ten defensive tackles occupying scholarships on the 2025 roster might seem like overkill. Regardless, Sarkisian wanted to ensure the Longhorns had enough depth to fortify the rotation through what will be a long season if Texas makes another deep run in the College Football Playoff.

“When you look at our team, I think about January,” Sarkisian said. “As much as I'm thinking about Aug. 30, I'm thinking about this journey we're trying to go on.”

While it might take a few games for Sarkisian, Baker and Pete Kwiatkowski to figure out an optimal rotation, a deep mix of tackles is something the Longhorns didn’t have in 2024.

Collins (593 snaps) and Broughton (588) both logged more than 500 snaps last season, according to Pro Football Focus. Lole (469) and Norton (260) were the only other Texas tackles to play more than 100 snaps, with January’s snap total finishing a distant fifth among Longhorn interior defensive linemen.

“Where we're at now, a lot of these guys probably would've been able to spell those guys more than we were able to last year,” Sarkisian said. “I think that's probably the difference. Some of those guys, if they were on our team last season, Vernon and Alfred might not have had to have played as many snaps as they did a year ago.”

What that might look like when the dust settles on the 2025 season is a distribution of snaps similar to how the Texas defensive tackles operated in 2022.

A group that eventually produced six NFL draft picks, including a first-rounder (Byron Murphy II in 2024) and two second-rounders (Collins in 2025 and T’Vondre Sweat in 2024), the defense’s top six tackles in Sarkisian's second season got enough snaps to be impactful during a 13-game campaign. Sweat’s 35.7 snaps played per game led the unit, followed by Keondre Coburn (31.9), Moro Ojomo (31.3), Murphy (30.2), Collins (21.6) and Broughton (20.3).

When looking back at the snap totals within the tackle group in 2021, the Longhorns got more from Sweat (26.3 snaps per game in 2021) and Murphy (24.8), which helped Ojomo (35.9) and Coburn (32.4) maximize their time on the field. A deeper, more effective tip of the spear helped Texas finish 22nd nationally in yards per rushing attempt allowed (3.48) and 32nd in rushing yards per game allowed (125.7), a drastic turnaround from Kwiatkowski's forgettable debut (201.6 yards per game and 5.15 yards per attempt allowed).

According to PFF’s snap totals from the 2024 season, Watson (37.9 snaps per game) logged the most playing time at his previous stop, followed by Brevard (34.7), Shaw (25.9), Johnson (20.5) and Kanu (7.8). Based on their season-long PFF grades, a rotation could help Texas get more consistent production from Watson and Brevard.

No defensive tackle in the Sarkisian era has logged as much playing time in one season as Watson did as a true freshman in the ACC. A few fewer snaps per game could do for Watson what it did for Brevard, whose PFF grade improved from a 60.6 in 2023, when he played in 11 games for the Boilermakers and averaged 35.6 snaps per game, to a 75 last season (a PFF grade of 70 is considered above average).

The competition for snaps will bleed into the regular season, which is fine with Sarkisian. If the master plan Sarkisian put into motion works, and the 2025 defensive tackle outlook rivals what happened in 2022, Baker's group should have a lot left in the tank when it matters most in December and January.

“That's what my goal was coming into the season: Could we develop that room into where we can play a lot of players, a lot of people, so that over time, that wear and tear wouldn't take its toll on us?” Sarkisian said. “I think we've done that.”