Big 12 Media Days: Steve Sarkisian Sees Something Different at Texas

The Longhorns' head man says he took the hard road in transitioning the program, but that's already begun to pay dividends.

ARLINGTON, TX — Steve Sarkisian says he sees something different in his players this year.

On Thursday at Big 12 Media Day at AT&T Stadium, the second-year Texas coach said new coaches generally have two ways of doing things in their first year: try to stick closely to what the previous regime did and ease the transition for the players, or do things your way and just take your lumps in the first season.

That happened last year, Sarkisian said, as the Longhorns stumbled to a 5-7 record.

But taking the latter route, showing patience and establishing one’s own culture, he added, also has its rewards. Often, those can manifest in the second year. Sarkisian said he’s seeing it now.

“I was having lunch with all the guys here today,” Sarkisian said, “listening to them talk about what year

two feels like in comparison to year one, it's night and day.

“For a head coach, that's really encouraging because we've got a lot of new faces on our team. But when your

leadership of your team believes so strongly in what you're doing, it's a lot easier for the young guys to fall in line.”

Sarkisian said he’s not trying to rebuild the roster for membership into the SEC. He explained that that process began the day he got the job after a stint as Nick Saban’s offensive coordinator at Alabama.

“Having come from the SEC, I had an idea of a style of play I wanted to play regardless of the conference we were gonna be in,” Sarkisian said. “That was a big, physical front on both sides of the ball with speed on the perimeter. So we had already started to develop our roster and to build our roster that way.

“So, regardless of this year in the Big 12 or next year in the Big 12 or whatever this is gonna look like, our style of play that we have in place is one that, regardless of who we play, is going to be one that fits us and what we want to do.

“We’re moving in that direction to make that happen. So it’s not as challenging for me because we’re not trying to shift one way or go to another. This is just our belief in who we want to be as a team.”