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    Jeff Howe
    SAN ANTONIO — The final day of the Texas High School Coaches Association’s annual convention and coaching school is marked by the keynote address, delivered by a college head coach.
    This year, Texas coach Steve Sarkisian will speak to the high school coaches gathered inside San Antonio’s Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center on Tuesday.
    On Texas Football is onsite to hear Sarkisian’s remarks with 39 standing between the Longhorns and the 2025 season opener against reigning national champion Ohio State.
    Jeff Howe
    SAN ANTONIO — When Texas hits the turf at Ohio Stadium in 40 days for a College Football Playoff semifinal return bout against Ohio State, Steve Sarkisian will be involved in a season opener the likes of which he hasn’t been a part of in 22 years.
    The Longhorns and Buckeyes should be among the highest-ranked teams in the Associated Press Top 25 when they pick up on Aug. 30 where they left off in the Cotton Bowl on Jan. 10. The last time Sarkisian kicked off a season in a game featuring two top-10 squads, he was in his third season coaching USC’s quarterbacks for Pete Carroll when the eighth-ranked Trojans went into Jordan-Hare Stadium and smacked No. 6 Auburn, 23-0.
    That’s one of three times throughout Sarkisian’s collegiate coaching career in which he’s had to prepare a team for a season opener on the road against a current member of a Power Four conference. He hasn’t coached a season opener against an AP Top 25 foe since 2013 (Washington soundly defeated No. 19 Boise State, at home, 38-6).
    Still, Sarkisian is drawing on those experiences to prepare his squad for “probably the most daunting challenge of a first game” in his career.
    “You just try to tap into those things throughout your career that you've been through,” Sarkisian said on Sunday at the Texas High School Coaches Association Convention in San Antonio. “How can you benefit from that?”
    Like the team Sarkisian is taking to Columbus, USC lacked extensive experience at key positions entering the 2003 season. First-round NFL draft picks Carson Palmer and Troy Polamalu were among five Trojans selected from a team that finished Carroll’s second season with a share of the Pac-10 title and an 11-2 record after a rout of Iowa in the Orange Bowl.
    Matt Leinart’s starting debut came against the Tigers. The shutout win over Auburn, which received a first-place vote in the preseason AP Top 25, also marked the USC debuts of running backs Reggie Bush and LenDale White; Bush and Leinart were two of seven Trojans on the 2003 roster (USC went 12-1 that season and split the national championship with an LSU team coached by Nick Saban) who went on to become first-round NFL draft picks.
    Led by four preseason All-SEC first-team selections (DJ Campbell, Anthony Hill, Colin Simmons, Michael Taaffe and Quintrevion Wisner), the Longhorns’ current roster could prove worthy of standing side by side with the most talented collegiate teams with which Sarkisian has been associated. Wanting to ensure the 2025 squad puts its best foot forward against the reigning national champions, Sarkisian will maximize the team's preseason practice time while maintaining a proven camp format.
    “The first 2.5 weeks or so of training camp have been truly that — of training camp. Then, we've adjusted, kind of, into that third week, where we've gotten into that first opponent, that bigger opponent,” Sarkisian said. A few years ago, it was Alabama for that week. Last year, it was Michigan. This year, it would be Ohio State. That was really implementing the game plan for that game. In the fourth week, we would then game-plan and prepare for our first opponent.
    “This year, what it'll look like more [is] kind of a two-week process to get ready for the game,” he continued. “Similar, in a sense, I guess you could say, almost to a bowl game. Yet, the reality of it is, probably with a little more physicality, a little more opportunity to tackle and to do those things to make sure that you're sharp.”
    There are concerns to address going into a season opener, regardless of the opponent. For Sarkisian, tackling and ball security top the list, as they do for most coaches.
    While issues relating to alignment, assignment and communication can be problematic early in the season, Sarkisian also mentioned "dealing with performance anxiety." Not every current Texas player was on the field for meaningful snaps in Tuscaloosa, Ann Arbor, College Station or other road environments similar to the Horseshoe that the Longhorns have experienced.
    For Sarkisian, no stone will be left unturned by the Longhorns to make sure they're ready for their second meeting with Ohio State in less than eight months.
    “If I can put them in some of those elements, as well as the staff putting together a good game plan, and then we can get up there and go cut it loose and go play,” Sarkisian said.
    Jeff Howe
    On Texas Football coverage of SEC Media Days is brought to you by Vonlane, Flat Creek Estate Winery, Advanced Pain Care and South Point Dodge.
    ***
    ATLANTA — The palpable buzz Texas created at SEC Media Days on Tuesday doesn’t guarantee anything regarding the outcome of the 2025 season.
    Still, coach Steve Sarkisian, quarterback Arch Manning and the Longhorns dominated the conversation before, during and after they made their way through the College Football Hall of Fame.
    The Texas hype reached a fever pitch before OTF 5-star linebacker Tyler Atkinson (Loganville, Ga./Grayson) went live on ESPN and committed to Texas on the “Pat McAfee Show." James Johnson’s (Cape Coral, Fla./Miami Northwestern) flip from Georgia to the Longhorns a few hours later punctuated a day when Sarkisian’s program went into Kirby Smart’s backyard, planted a flag with authority and headed home with two elite future defensive pieces — the No. 1 recruit in Georgia and a blue-chip defensive lineman previously bound for Smart’s Bulldogs  — in the fold.
    The rivalry between Texas and Georgia is currently a one-sided affair on the field. The Longhorns didn’t find their footing in time to make a 30-15 regular-season loss to the Bulldogs more competitive, and Georgia emerged victorious from a slugfest at Mercedes-Benz Stadium for the SEC title.
    “To be honest, they out-physicalled us in that first game,” All-American safety Michael Taaffe said Tuesday. “We’ve got to come with a physical nature and a sense of pride knowing that if we want to get to where we want to go in December, we’ve got to beat those guys.”
    Smart once girded his loins and aimed at supplanting Nick Saban’s Alabama dynasty as college football's new gold standard. With 105 wins, three conference championships and two national titles through nine seasons at his alma mater, Smart’s program is the top dog in the SEC.
    Sarkisian’s 38 wins are tied with Mack Brown for the most of any Longhorn coach through their first four seasons. Consecutive trips to the College Football Playoff prove Sarkisian has Texas on the verge of entering another golden era on the Forty Acres.
    Smart and the Bulldogs are the biggest obstacles to Sarkisian and the Longhorns getting over the hump.
    The schools combined to produce 25 picks in the 2025 NFL Draft, including six first-rounders. With Sarkisian and Smart leading the way, Texas and Georgia are positioned to duke it out head-to-head in a climb for the summit for the foreseeable future.
    “I think those are the two premier programs and premier coaches in college football,” Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin said Monday.
    Between his time with Sarkisian under Pete Carroll at USC (2001-03; 2005-06) and on Saban's Crimson Tide staff (2016), Kiffin’s offense went against Smart's defense on the practice field in Tuscaloosa during the 2014 and 2015 seasons. Touting Sarkisian and Smart as “really good friends and really good people,” Kiffin isn’t surprised to see two "phenomenal coaches” guiding organizations that are thriving against the sport's chaotic, uncertain backdrop.
    “I feel like both these guys really run their program truly as a CEO and know everything that's going on,” Kiffin said. “They're very creative in their ideas and how to navigate through this world we're in now.”
    Saban once transitioned from the hunter to the hunted when Alabama ended Urban Meyer’s phenomenal Florida run; a 32-13 triumph in the 2009 SEC Championship Game opened the door for Saban to win his first national championship with the Crimson Tide. The target every SEC coach currently has in their crosshairs is the one on Smart’s back, a reality from which the Longhorns aren’t shying away.
    “We want to play against the best teams in the world,” All-American linebacker Anthony Hill Jr. said Tuesday. “Going against them is a great test for us throughout the season.”
    After squaring off in Austin and Atlanta, the third meeting between Texas and Georgia in a 392-day window will be the Longhorns’ first-ever game between Sanford Stadium’s hedges. The Bulldogs own college football’s longest active home winning streak, which could reach 37 games by the time the Longhorns make their way to Athens on Nov. 15.
    “Playing them in the regular season is going to be a really good game,” Hill said. “We know we have to play them at their house, so we're looking forward to that test. I know it's going to be a really tough game for us, but we're ready.”
    Sarkisian's red-and-black tinted roadblock isn’t unprecedented. He's not the first Texas coach who had to slay a dragon while pursuing championship glory.
    While an early-season road win over Ohio State established the Longhorns as bona fide title contenders in 2005, Brown had to wait until an October trip to Dallas for the Red River Shootout for a chance to get the monkey off his back. He shed it, snapping a five-game losing streak against Bob Stoops emphatically, with a 45-12 thrashing of Oklahoma, which fast-tracked Texas to the Rose Bowl and a date with destiny against USC.
    The Longhorns are locked in on their Cotton Bowl rematch with the Buckeyes in Columbus, a chance to make a statement out of the gate in the season opener on Aug. 30.
    Nevertheless, game No. 10 on the schedule will judge whether Texas is ready for the next step in its journey under Sarkisian or not.
    For his part, Smart downplayed his budding rivalry with Sarkisian while tipping his cap, ever so slightly, to the Longhorns when he addressed Georgia’s recent success against Texas.
    “Tremendous respect for him and his program, the job they do,” he said. “To beat good teams, you've got to be a good team. We had a good football team last year. So did they. It's not about us as coaches. It's really about the players and what you believe in.”
    Hours later, Sarkisian departed the Peach State with two players coveted by Smart, who started the day by mentioning that the Bulldogs value “relationships over transactions” in recruiting. Texas isn’t going away, with Sarkisian running down a laundry list of everything the Longhorns have to offer before declaring Texas to be “an attractive school for players to want to come take a look at.”
    Whether it’s in recruiting, the NFL draft or between the chalked lines, the newest rivalry in the fight for SEC supremacy is afoot.
    Jeff Howe
    On Texas Football coverage of SEC Media Days is brought to you by Vonlane, Flat Creek Estate Winery, Advanced Pain Care and South Point Dodge.
    ***
    ATLANTA — SEC Media Days wrap up at the College Football Hall of Fame in Atlanta on Thursday. Three Texas opponents on the 2025 conference schedule are scheduled to make the rounds throughout the day: Arkansas, Kentucky and Texas A&M. 
    Jeff Howe
    On Texas Football coverage of SEC Media Days is brought to you by Vonlane, Flat Creek Estate Winery, Advanced Pain Care and South Point Dodge.
    ***
    ATLANTA — Texas has left the building, but OTF is still at the College Football Hall of Fame, ready for day No. 3 of SEC Media Days.
    On the heels of a memorable Tuesday for Steve Sarkisian and the Longhorns, Wednesday’s activity begins with Alabama and Mississippi State this morning, followed by Florida and Oklahoma in the afternoon. Kalen DeBoer kicks things off when he takes the podium at 8:05 a.m., with Jeff Lebby (9:50 a.m.), Billy Napier (noon) and Brent Venables (1:45 p.m.) rounding out the coaches' press conferences on the main stage.
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