Steve Sarkisian

I think it’s going to behoove all of us in the athletic department

It can help us for 12 months. I think so many people hear ‘Bevo Lab,’ and it’s just game day. There’s a lot that goes into that. As you all know, I believe in sports science. I think we’ve come too far not to believe in science.

Been really proud of our team this week — they have worked extremely hard

Now is not the time for relief syndrome

I watched him coach six little girls like it was the NBA Finals, and that was the level of intensity that that guy brought every day

Let me be the first to tell you. We were not perfect tonight, by any means

borderline arrogant.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t say, this is the ultimate team sport

What amazing atmosphere and energy (Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium) was again, and for those fans that sold their tickets, they missed a hell of a game tonight

I think there’s no doubt about it — Arch can play better for us

I would use the word edgy, and I like it

He’s done a heck of a job

Dia is as far along, or maybe even further along, than anybody we’ve had in that role, and that’s a credit to him

Obviously we’re extremely disappointed

There’s no doubt about it, Arch can play better for us, but he's our starter

Sometimes that’s patting him on the back. Sometimes that’s tough love, and we’ve got to be honest with him on where he needs to improve

The player is in there, and it’s our job to get it out of him.

He's got a chip on his shoulder

It’s easy to listen to the outside noise, the ‘sky is falling and the season’s over,’

We’re right in the middle of an SEC race

I think we (have) an opportunity this week to show the true character of this team

Well, I think that’s our job as coaches, and that’s part for Arch, the player, right

He gets his first team reps like, that’s what he’ll get

I mean, you know, in a weird way, I’m a little sick that way. I like a little adversity

I just felt like we didn’t play good offensive football, and we’re not playing great offensive football right now

It was hard because everybody was taking turns (making mistakes), and it’d be easy for me to say ‘Hey, Arch was the problem today,’

I’m probably harder on myself than anybody, and I’ll evaluate this game the same way

We’re not playing good offensive football right now, so everything is going to be evaluated

Yeah, well, I think, one, they’ve got really good players. So that’s the first part

Great to get back to DKR this weekend

Our ability to create turnovers is critical to our success

Any time you have the amount of three-and-outs that we have right now, that is kind of like when you look at your grandma’s Christmas tree, and there’s that blinking light. That’s the blinking light

There were good runs today. It just wasn’t consistent enough

Not all storms come to disrupt our life

The opinions of others (do) not dictate the way I think, or the way we operate or the way we perform

took that loss tough

And so it’s not the end of the season

I think you can go through ebbs and flows of rhythm and scheme and tie it all together

I think I can always do better

Naturally, anytime you come out of a bye week, if we do it right, we should be healthier than we were going into the bye week

I think all the tools that we look for in a running back have shown up for him

That hurt because we had a plan for him (against Ohio State)

I hope we kick his ass

We talk about playing with emotion, not (being) emotional

It’s the most special setting in college football

I love all of that that this thing comes with

I know the highlight is Colin … but I thought sophomore defensive lineman Lance Jackson had his best game since he’s been a Longhorn

(Geffard) was playing 65-75 snaps a game (at Arkansas), and that’s a lot for a really big human being like him

We took him out, we addressed it and put him back in

The one thing that you have to be aware of when the president goes to any game is that any time he enters the stadium, leaves the stadium or changes locations within the stadium, they cut all communication

A good friend of mine is Mario Cristobal

You have to have a plan to adjust if and when he comes in the middle of the first quarter, leaves in the fourth quarter, or decides he’s got to use the restroom, whatever that looks like

His legs are a really good weapon

We’re going into what I would probably consider as the loudest stadium in the country

I think naturally for us, when we go on the road, we’ve got to focus on what we need to do

I don’t think Arch cares that much

He’s never been before, so I’m sure for the family and for Arch to play on the field that his uncle played on, … it’s all part of the journey

This guy is squeezing every ounce of juice out of this experience

He’s earned the respect of the locker room

Our defense kind of just kicked their ass

Our defense just kicked their ass

I just felt like offensively we started off in a pretty good groove, and then it was just kind of a choppy game

We’ve got to clean stuff up, I get that

We come out of stretch, and the first thing we do is a sudden-change drill, and we spot the ball at the 18-yard line

We’ve been emphasizing being a more physical football team, being a more physical offensive team and running the football when they know you’re going to run the football … and having the ability to have confidence to call it that way

you’ve got to go for it.

The players and the staff are the ones that give me the confidence to make those calls

A week ago, the narrative was we can’t win the big game

Our ball security is awful right now

I think we’ll get Derrek Cooper back this week, which will be great for us

We’ve got other guys with some bumps and bruises, and that’s where the depth needs to start to step up so we can rotate some guys

They didn’t hire me to keep it close

They hired me to win.

It comes down to execution

I don’t think I need to really spend so much energy and time on what this game means

We need to focus on the task at hand, and we need to be enamored with (ourselves) because I think this week can be full of distractions if you allow them to be distractions

I’m not so consumed with what the end result might be

This guy’s been working hard

For the first time running out of the tunnel at DKR and putting this jersey on and understanding what you’re playing for, I thought (our transfers) did a nice job

There were so many ways we felt like we had to move (Wingo) around to create opportunities for him

At the end of the day, we don’t really have to change

The SEC is a physically taxing league, … but I would argue it’s almost more mentally taxing

I don’t question our effort, our intent or our physicality

I’m excited for these guys

The fact that somebody out there is going to take a player off of an NFL roster and tell somebody who’s been doing it for nine months to go kick rocks, that doesn’t sit well with me

I think for KJ, he continues to show us his gamer mentality

I will say Dia is as far along or maybe even further along than anybody we’ve had in that role

The two hardest-playing players on our team right now are Graceson Littleton and Emmett Mosley, and they’re playing at an extremely high level

(They are) two guys that push themselves every day, whether it’s in the pass game (or) the run game

We are counting on Jonah, and we’re pushing him

The length of the season has made me think more about it

It was very intentional in what we were trying to do — putting a roster together that could go the distance

I don’t know what’s going to happen, and I don’t even know if it’s good or not

Now, we really can just keep developing all of our players

I credit the guys that are returning in the program for embodying what we believe in

There’s a lot of tall receivers with long arms, but it’s (Coleman’s) ability to have the right balance and body control and timing on balls

I didn’t like it

From the linebacker perspective, when you really think about it, and you think about the amount of nickel you really play in a season and what that looks like, you’re thinking about two backers the majority of time on the field

His strength is his catch radius, but beyond that, it’s the balance and body control

I feel like we’ve forgotten about Ryan Wingo

I feel good, and for as physical as this camp has been, I think that’s encouraging

He’s in real freshman moments right now

I don’t worry about it

I think all three of these guys exude the leadership that is needed, the commitment to the program, the commitment to their teammates and the mental and physical toughness to be a champion

Like anything in this world, if you want to be really good at something, then you have got to take risks

I don’t know yet about Notre Dame — we’ll see

I think in this day and age of the [Transfer] Portal and high school, you’ve got to have the ability to be strategic

Those are the moments that are going to get us through the tough fourth quarters. Those are the moments that are going to get us through some tough road games of where we’re headed this fall

To make the moves we make … we had to let DeAndre Moore go. We had to let Parker Livingstone go. We had to let Tre Wisner go. We had to let CJ Baxter go

We’re going to coach him. We’re going to develop him. When he’s ready, I think he’ll be good enough to play. How long that takes to get him ready? That’s going to be the race. That’s the challenge

Week 1, Week 4, Week 8? I don’t know. I do know he’s got the right competitive spirit. I do know he’s got the skill set and the ability to be a good player for us

He provides great length, great speed, tremendous man-to-man ability, very confident, very aggressive. All the attributes you want in a defensive back

Then we had some failures as a team

He didn’t play to the way of what he was capable of playing. Then those same people that were saying that about him wanted to criticize and demean him almost for letting them down because he didn’t live up to what they thought he was going to be. Very interesting concept right there.

I think he learned a lot about himself last year about dealing with adversity and overcoming. I think he learned a lot about his teammates and the support that they gave him and them recognizing the mental and physical toughness that he has to play the position, to be their leader. I think that he’s grown into a great leader for us

(Cole is) a guy that unfortunately didn’t get drafted, and so he puts himself in a bit of a different situation than maybe most guys that got done playing their fourth year in college

We made a conscious effort this year to try to get older

I think one way you can try to get a little older is trying to keep and retain your players that have been in your program for that fourth and that fifth year, which is tough to do.

Where we’re at as a state of a program is that we’re getting variable, varying players – some that may have an immediate impact, some that we’re trying to project from a developmental standpoint of what they can look like down the road

It wasn’t a slight against Tech

Honestly, truthfully, I would love to keep Notre Dame on our schedule

What’s going to happen to the CFP? That’s the hard part

You know, we haven’t had the discussion

I really do. I think he loves the University of Texas. You know, he does pretty good through NIL.

I think some of that is dependent upon, you know, how we play as a team this fall, how he plays individually, knock on wood, injury-free football, things like that

At Texas, we will only take 50% of a player’s academic credit hours

There’s a team in our state that plays in another conference that has a schedule that I would argue if I played with our twos and our threes, we could go undefeated, and they’ll probably make the CFP this year

We need to find a way to find equity in strength of schedule or reward those teams that are playing that type of strength of schedule

I probably shouldn’t have used ‘basket-weaving’ as my example for the class. Macroeconomics, I don’t give a damn whatever the class is. Yoga, we have yoga at UT. The class part of it was irrelevant

At UT, you have to complete half of your degree at the University of Texas. You have to do those 60 hours at UT to get a degree from the University of Texas. At a school like Ole Miss, I’ll reference it that way, they can take one class and get a degree … My point is that was one of the inequalities and discrepancies that we deal with in college athletics.

Arch could have dragged us over the coals for six million, seven million, whatever he wanted. That’s an extra five million that I can go get a Cam Coleman, go get a Hollywood Smothers and go get a Rasheem Biles

I would say probably for the first time I feel like we have the top-level talent across the board position by position on both sides of the ball

He had a lingering thing that he’d been dealing with over a couple of years that we just wanted to clean up