'It's About Our Actions': Steve Sarkisian Responds to High Texas Longhorns Expectations

Texas is yet again at the forefront of the college football world, and expectations and criticism alike are crowding the media space. Texas Longhorns head coach Steve Sarkisian responds to the hype, and the critique, ahead of the 2024 CFB season.

Jul 17, 2024; Dallas, TX, USA; Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian speaking at Omni Dallas Hotel. Mandatory Credit: Brett Patzke-USA TODAY Sports / Brett Patzke-USA TODAY Sports

Steve Sarkisian and the Texas Longhorns are no strangers to pre-season hype. The age-old adage of Texas has become somewhat of a meme in the college football community, with many fans growing more and more upset at the presumed “overrated” Longhorns.

As SEC Media Days have come and gone, peak offseason ranking narratives are surfacing yet again. Pundits like Josh Pate have predicted Texas to outright win the SEC, while former coach Nick Saban thinks the Longhorns aren’t ready for SEC play yet. When you look at Twitter and forum comments, its obvious what the rest of SEC fans think of the newcomer. 

Many fans point to the 2010 Longhorn collapse, or the fact that Texas has performed worse than pre-season poll rankings in seven of its last 14 seasons, as a way to discredit the Longhorns heading into 2024. However, for Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian, that seems to be just noise to him.

“At the end of the day, it's not about what other people think,” Sarkisian said. “t's not about what we say we're going to do. It's about our actions. It's about the way we actually perform and that's going to be our focus.”

 Sarkisian advocated for his squad during the SEC Media Days, especially with the kindling of old rivalries against Arkansas and Texas A&M, and made sure reporters were aware of his opinions after a College Football Playoff appearance.

Dec 29, 2014; Houston, TX, USA; Arkansas Razorbacks quarterback Brandon Allen (10) runs past Texas Longhorns defensive end Cedric Reed (88) during the game in the 2014 Texas Bowl at NRG Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Kevin Jairaj-USA TODAY Sports / Kevin Jairaj-USA TODAY Sports

But questions will always arise with the Longhorns, who underperformed pre-season AP Poll expectations in both of Sarkisian's first two years. But though Sarkisian enjoys the practice, he doesn’t see much merit in projections and rankings.

“I'll say that I love preseason polls. I love preseason all-conference teams and all-american teams because it gives the college football fan and the pundits stuff to talk about. And it keeps college football at the forefront of what's going on. And like I said, I think our sport is at an all-time high from a popularity standpoint,” Sarkisian said. 

But preseason rankings aren’t his focus.

“Where we fall is irrelevant, we have to go play the games, and we have to perform, and we have to work through the adversity that we get faced with, and we gotta rely on depth, and we gotta continue to develop our players as the season goes on,” Sarkisian added.

The Longhorns were voted as the No. 2 team in its new conference for 2024 and is one of the few schools with double-digit All-SEC players on the roster. Expectations are indeed high for Texas, but that doesn’t seem to bother Sarkisian or the rest of the Longhorn team. 

The focus is now clearer than ever for this team: Playoffs or Bust.