Trust and Confidence: Notes From Sark’s Post-Bama Presser

It happened.

Texas defeated Alabama by a final score of 34-24 on Saturday, and the ‘Horns are now ranked 4th in the nation (highest ranking since 2009). If you followed along last year, Sarkisian would talk repeatedly about “rat poison” (essentially just extreme hype) whenever Texas had a big win. This year’s message was different, though. Let’s take a quick look at all he had to say today at today’s presser. 

-Sark started the presser by stating that he thought Saturday was “a really good team win” and consistently talked about the amount of confidence, poise, and effort that was seen in the victory as well. He stated that the team could “feel” the fans in the stadium and was extremely grateful to all of the Longhorn faithful.

-Texas had 2 fumbles during Saturday’s game and luckily recovered both. Sarkisian stated that they “have to take care of the ball better than we [Texas] did. That thing [football] can not be as loose as it was”. 

-A quote that stuck with me throughout the presser was “We [Texas] want to be a little more aggressive than we’ve shown historically”. This seemed to be evident on Saturday as the Longhorns used several sweep plays and even a trick play with WR Xavier Worthy throwing the ball down the field. Sarkisian also mentioned Kansas City Chiefs head coach Andy Reid and how he allows his players to come up with new plays and try them out. 

-Regarding CJ Baxter’s injury, Sarkisian said it’s not as serious as they initially thought it was but he was still very limited at practice this morning (Monday). 

-Sarkisian mentioned 3 specific things Texas thrived at when asked about the passing game on Saturday: getting the coverages, phenomenal route running and Ewers putting air underneath the ball.

-Regarding the run game on Saturday as a whole, Sarkisian said he “knew the yards would get hard… I was very encouraged on a few of those kinds of 3rd down runs… I felt like we could have ran the ball better if I was a little more committed to it…” 

-Throughout the conference, Sarkisian emphasized how he wanted and still wants his guys to feel very confident after their big win, but called it a “slippery slope” due to also trying to critique the team in spots where they can get better: “I’m trying to point out areas of improvement so we can keep growing as a team”. 

-Sark spoke about enjoying the moment and the win himself: “In sports, a lot of times, we don’t take it all in…  I got to go into the locker room and put a cigar in my mouth and take a picture with my son… I just try to take those few moments…”. 

Next up for the ‘Horns is a Wyoming team that hasn’t given up 100 yards on the ground in either of their first 2 games, and beat a strong Texas Tech team in Week 1. 

-Twitter: @RSwantkowski