Notes from Steve Sarkisian's Thursday media Zoom

On3 imageby:Joe Cook09/16/21

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Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian was available to the media over Zoom on Thursday. Here is what he had to say ahead of the Texas Longhorns’ upcoming home game versus the Rice Owls.

Sarkisian: “For this week, especially coming off of the disappointment of last week, I really liked the intent of our team in practice. I think they’ve been very intentional with the work that we’re trying to put in. I think they’re focused on improving individually so that we can improve collectively, and you see that not only on the field but definitely in the meeting room. Which, you don’t like that to have to happen. You don’t like something bad to happen like a loss that we had to stoke that fire. But clearly that did, and I’d have been really concerned if it didn’t do that to us, if it didn’t make us feel like ‘I need to do more. I need to dig deeper to make that happen.’”

Jahdae Barron is out this week with a knee sprain and could be sidelined for up to three weeks. Troy Omeire is not available this week and is listed as week-to-week. Jared Wiley will be back this week.

-On Casey Thompson: “I think he’s been very consistent, which I appreciate about him. He’s come to work. He’s put in the work in the meeting room. He’s put in the work on the field. He’s asked good questions. I think he trusts his process and his preparation, which is a great space to be in. I think you can find that space when you’re a fourth-year player. You’ve been through it. You know what it looks like.”

-Asked by IT, word for word: “You mentioned Monday you believed your offensive line needed to play more together in your system. How do you think that starting five practiced this week, and will we see that same starting five this Saturday versus Rice?”

Sarkisian: “I think when I talked about the intent of our team, I was probably speaking as much about that unit in and of itself. I think there’s been real intent in the approach of them working together, playing together, finishing blocks, sustaining those blocks, but again, being a cohesive unit. It’s not about one guy, it’s about understanding where my help is coming from. Understanding the calls internally to deal with the leverage of defensive linemen and leverages of where linebackers are, and then trusting the calls and working together. Like I said, sometimes those issues become glaring after a loss because I don’t necessarily think we didn’t have some of those issues versus Louisiana. But sometimes as players we don’t quite understand why that would be an issue when we just won a ballgame. Well, now, all of a sudden you lose a game, and they start to become glaring to the players. As I said, you don’t always want to have a loss to magnify the issues that we have, that we need to rectify. Sometimes that’s needed and I think this week was definitely that case.”

-On wideout, he mentioned he tried to get more backups in the game, specifically Marcus Washington and Kelvontay Dixon. “Hopefully we can get a few more guys going.”

-Sarkisian said they only ran one play where Thompson could have pulled the ball and run by design. His other runs were off-schedule tuck-and-runs.

-Sarkisian mentioned the need to find ways to continually get Xavier Worthy involved offensively. “I love what he brings every day. I think he’s a very mentally tough kid. I think he works at his craft. I think he’s very smart. He has a high football IQ. Obviously, he has elite speed and he’s electric with the ball in his hands. We would be remiss not to try and get him the football. It’s nothing he has or hasn’t done. We just haven’t been able to get him the ball as much as we would have liked here in the first few games.”

-On Rice: “They force you to communicate. They force you to be on the same page because you can go three straight plays and get three completely different fronts and three completely different coverages, and I think the same kind of goes for them offensively, too.”

-What does Sarkisian want to see this week that he didn’t see last week?: “I want to see us play a disciplined, physical brand of football that doesn’t make the unnecessary or unforced errors, but then also maximizes and capitalizes on opportunities when they present themselves to us. I don’t know if we’ve done that even in the first game. I think we had some opportunities to make some plays in all three phases quite frankly. And for one reason or another we’ve missed those opportunities.”

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