{"id":55760,"date":"2023-12-05T09:00:50","date_gmt":"2023-12-05T14:00:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/?p=55760"},"modified":"2025-09-13T15:54:38","modified_gmt":"2025-09-13T19:54:38","slug":"new-era-of-texas-football","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/2023\/12\/05\/new-era-of-texas-football\/","title":{"rendered":"New Era Of Texas Football"},"content":{"rendered":"

A new era of Texas football has begun. \u00a0A return to college football\u2019s elite came right on time for third-year Head Coach Steve Sarkisian<\/strong>.\u00a0 This was supposed to be a rebuilding year after last year\u2019s 8-5 mark.\u00a0 Texas improved to 12-1 and was elevated to the ranks of the elite by the CFP Committee.\u00a0 The Longhorns face the Washington Huskies (13-0) in the Sugar Bowl on Jan. 1 in a semifinal for the National Championship.<\/p>\n

Texas and Washington met last year in the postseason. \u00a0Washington beat Texas 27-20 in the Alamo Bowl, a game with far less on the line than their rematch.\u00a0 Both teams now step into the spotlight of the Sugar Bowl.\u00a0 The project Sarkisian has had underway in Austin the past three years is now being unveiled during primetime.\u00a0 The Longhorns made it to the big stage and with that comes being asked a lot of questions by the media.<\/p>\n

Rushing The Quarterback<\/h3>\n

\u201cWe just continue to do what we do, and not worry about what\u2019s going on outside this building,\u201d Quinn Ewers<\/a> said, moments after the Longhorns were chosen by the CFP Selection Committee.\u00a0 The news had barely had time to sink in when Texas players and coaches were made available to the media. \u00a0\u201cWe\u2019re just blessed, super blessed, to take part in this upcoming playoff,\u201d Ewers added.\u00a0 He said he didn\u2019t sleep very well the night before the selection committee released its final rankings.<\/p>\n

Ewers spoke candidly in his immediate reaction to Texas being chosen.\u00a0 The new era of Texas football has begun under his watch.\u00a0 Building a new era of Texas football was why he became a Longhorn.\u00a0 \u201cIt\u2019s unreal,” he said.\u00a0 “I get goosebumps every time I even think about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The sophomore quarterback gave credit to his older teammates who played on the 5-7 team two years ago when Sarkisian was just getting started.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s no better feeling for those guys, and I\u2019m just glad to be part of a team that is able to enjoy it that much because they know what\u2019s it like to be disregarded.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Alabama Factor<\/h3>\n

Texas was all over everybody\u2019s radar when the Longhorns knocked off Alabama in September.\u00a0 But ever since, the argument going around has been that the Alabama of today is not the same team Texas beat in Tuscaloosa that warm September night.\u00a0 The prospects of an Alabama rematch weren\u2019t lost on Ewers.\u00a0 A victory over Washington would give Texas a shot at its first national title since Vince Young<\/strong> claimed it in the 2006 Rose Bowl.\u00a0 When asked to rate his team\u2019s chances of winning it all, Ewers said, \u201cI\u2019m always going to bet on us, ’cause I\u2019m a little biased I guess.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Long Road<\/h3>\n

One of the players from the 5-7 team is Jaylan Ford<\/a>.\u00a0 The progress the Longhorns have made under Sarkisian started during that 2020 season.\u00a0 \u201cI think, for us, especially after that season ended, I think everybody was more motivated than ever to come out here and play better,\u201d Ford said.\u00a0 It took a great deal of resilience to make it to the Final Four from where Texas started.\u00a0 And now, not surprisingly, the Longhorns feel they have a shot to win it all.\u00a0 \u201cI feel we stack up evenly with anybody that we face,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

It was the Alabama game when the light switched on, he added.\u00a0 \u201cThe confidence definitely grew after that game.\u00a0 Not a lot of people can say they go into Alabama, and go to Tuscaloosa, and beat them.\u201d\u00a0 The Butkus Award semifinalist has been through the trenches of recent years.\u00a0 He said the goal this season was to win the Big 12 and it wasn’t expected to be easy.\u00a0 \u201cFor us it was just about handling business knowing that we had a small room for error.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Coach Is Talking<\/h3>\n

This was Sarkisian\u2019s breakthrough season after going 5-7 and 8-5.\u00a0 It came a year earlier than many expected.\u00a0 Now he has a month to prepare his team for a national semifinal.\u00a0 That’s a long time to prepare.\u00a0 \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of work to be done.\u00a0 We\u2019ve got a month until we play,” Sarkisian told the media.\u00a0 He made his first public comments within moments of Texas being chosen to play in the Sugar Bowl.\u00a0 “We\u2019ve got finals to take.\u00a0 We\u2019ve got to get healthy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sarkisian agreed it was the Alabama win that served as a springboard for the Longhorns\u2019 success.\u00a0 \u201cThat win gave us as much or more confidence than anything throughout the season to help us navigate our way through some of those tougher games late in the year because it gave us more belief in what we were doing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reason For Being<\/h3>\n

Sarkisian described his best moments as those watching his players celebrate winning the Big 12 Championship.\u00a0 \u201cThat\u2019s why they came to the University of Texas,\u201d he said.\u00a0 Ever since the Alabama win gave Texas a glimpse of what the Longhorns could be, the standard was set for the new era of Texas football.\u00a0 The Longhorns kept going after that standard all season and bounced back from a loss<\/a> to rival Oklahoma in mid-October to make it to the playoffs.\u00a0 To get here, they overcame injuries and finished the season with an eight-game win streak. \u00a0\u201cI\u2019ve always felt like if we can get in, we can play with anybody in the country,\u201d Sarkisian said.<\/p>\n

Sarkisian said he knew how good Washington was going to be coming off last year\u2019s Alamo Bowl.\u00a0 Sure enough, both teams are back for a rematch but with much more on the line this time.\u00a0 The Longhorns are not just happy to be here.\u00a0 They are approaching the Sugar Bowl with a win in mind.\u00a0 That\u2019s been the mindset from Day One under Sarkisian.\u00a0 \u201cI understand there\u2019s high expectations and high standards here for winning championships, but that\u2019s why I came here.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"
Photo Credit: Kevin Jairaj-USA TODAY Sports<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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A new era of Texas football has begun. \u00a0A return to college football\u2019s elite came right on time for third-year Head Coach Steve Sarkisian.\u00a0 This was supposed to be a rebuilding year after last year\u2019s 8-5 mark.\u00a0 Texas improved to 12-1 and was elevated to the ranks of the elite by the CFP Committee.\u00a0 The […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4486,"featured_media":55764,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6,7361,10906,2,35576,2056],"tags":[10545,32821,5095,1333,204,2342],"class_list":["post-55760","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-big12","category-bowl-games","category-cfb","category-featured","category-texas-longhorns","category-top-25","tag-2023-big-12-football","tag-big-12-champions","tag-steve-sarkisian","tag-sugar-bowl","tag-texas-longhorns","tag-vince-young"],"modified_by":"Michael Kovacs, ADMIN","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55760","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4486"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55760"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55760\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":79456,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55760\/revisions\/79456"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55764"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55760"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55760"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55760"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}