Steve Sarkisian's analyst hires show focus on what's best for the program
It’s difficult to gauge just how much the recent hires made by Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian will actually effect the outcome of the season.
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The impact any special assistant to the head coach has almost feels nebulous.
But one thing’s for sure.
Sark is leaving no stone unturned.
On offense, he is expected to announce Paul Chryst, the former Wisconsin head coach, as the new hire. Chryst knows the power run game and play-action off of it as well as any coach in the country.
On defense, Sark opted for Payam Saadat. Saadat is a coach with decades of coordinator-level experience at the D-I level.
And perhaps for his biggest flex, Sark also added a special assistant for special teams, Joe DeCamillis. DeCamillas has been an NFL special teams coach for the past 30 years. You don’t make it that long in that league without knowing your stuff thoroughly.
Again, we may never know the extent these coaches will help on a week-by-week or even a gameplan or strategy basis. Yet it’s clear that Sark likes the idea of more smart people in the room than not.
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That’s a coach who is secure in his job and focused on what’s best for the team and program, nothing else.
And it’s a coach who appears to be on the attack yet again.
Paul Chryst File
Chryst was most recently the head coach at Wisconsin, where he won three Big 10 West titles and was a two-time Big 10 coach of the year. In seven-plus seasons leading the Badgers, Chryst was 86-45 and 43-18 in the Big 10. He led Wisconsin to four 10-win seasons, including wins in the Cotton, Orange, and Holiday Bowls. Chryst was 6-1 in bowl games.
Wisconsin parted ways with Chryst after five games in 2022. The Badgers were 2-3 at the time and elected to make Jim Leonhard the interim head coach following his firing.
Prior to his time in Madison, Chryst was head coach of Pittsburgh from 2012 to 2014. He was 19-19 in three seasons leading the Panthers and was 10-13 in conference play. He recorded a 3-4 record in the Big East in 2012 and a 7-12 record during Pitt’s first two seasons in the ACC.
Chryst played quarterback at Wisconsin from 1986 to 1988. The Badgers were 7-17 during those three years preceding the Barry Alvarez era in Madison.
Chryst had other college stops as an assistant at West Virginia, Illinois State, Oregon State, and Wisconsin-Platteville. He coached professional football with the San Antonio Riders, the Ottawa Rough Riders, the Saskatchewan Roughriders, and the San Diego Chargers.
