Jeff Howe

Great defense, depth and leadership are things Sark believes this Texas squad has in common with the other elite teams he's been a part of as a coach.

"I think the biggest thing is him staying true to his routine," Sark said of what he needs to see from Arch Manning before the game to know that he's ready to go.

Texas will lean into the history and leadership of the guys in the locker room who've been in games like this before.

"It's been a tough week," Sark said. "We made it difficult on them, especially the front end of the week."

We're officially under 48 hours to go until kickoff.

Fozzy!

Steve Sarkisian participated in today’s SEC Football Coaches Weekly Media Teleconference. 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.” View full news story

My brain says Nathan Vasher. My heart says Jordan Hicks, Shon Mitchell or Hodges Mitchell.

He's the best.

Billy "Sure" Schott!

Keilan Robinson was waived by the Eagles today.

Butch Hadnot, the Chris Warren III of his time.

That's it for Sark today. We'll hear from him again on Thursday after practice.

It's not included in the game notes package Texas sent out today. I wouldn't expect one to go public until Saturday.

"I spent about 20 seconds thinking about that when it came out," Sark said of the SEC moving to a nine-game schedule.

On the value of big-time non-conference games for the Texas program, Sark said it will serve the Longhorns well. It did last season when going to Michigan exposed the players to what they were potentially going to face at Kyle Field.

"I love them," Sark said of playing in big-time road environments.

Emmett Mosley has been limited, Sark said of his status.

"We've got to be very detail-oriented, minimize the self-inflicted wounds," Sark said.

The outcome of the game won't define who Texas is in 2025, Sark said. The Longhorns will get a lot of information that will help them grow from Saturday's game, no matter the outcome.

"We're fortunate enough to have the leadership of guys who've been in some big-time battles," Sark said.

He joked that they might do it more often, considering how many pre-snap penalties Texas had in home games last season.

Q: "Do you expect to have Trevor Goosby this weekend?" Sark: "Yeah, I do."

Sark said using crowd noise in practice forces the players to focus.