September 16, 2024 • 17 mins
Hear more sound from Steve Sarkisian's Monday press conference as he discusses the play of the defense through the first three weeks, Ryan Wingo, how to handle being ranked #1 in the AP Poll, the state of the running game with injuries, and how the playbook changes with Arch Manning's mobility.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
We're back.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
It's the Craig Way Show with Hall of Fame broadcaster
and voice of the Texas Longhearts Craig Way.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Is this music selection supposed to be some sort of
statement on my advancing age? Is that today being the
birthday and there's some sort of a funeral dirge or
something like that, you feel a little melancholy today. There's
some days when I do feel older than others. Feel
good today though, and with good reason and glad to
(00:37):
be with you here on this Monday afternoon. Let's go
back to hearing some from Long Worn's head coach Steve Sarkeishan.
He was talking about the offense last hour. Let's talk
a little bit. First of all, we'll talk about some defense.
He was asked about how his defensive staff has become
so cohesive so quickly in the addition of Johnny Nansen
(00:58):
and everything that's going on with the defensive staff. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
No, I think our defensive staff has done a tremendous job.
You know, we've we've adjusted some defensively from where we were,
and we've we've kind of evolved each year into where
we where we've gone from one year to the next,
And I think they've done a nice job. I think
the addition of Johnny Nansen coming on board has been
helpful with with PK and bouncing some new ideas off
(01:23):
of each other. But more importantly is I think that
our guys are playing a style of football that I'm
excited about. We play hard, we play fast, we play
physical defense. You know, we tackle really really well. We're
attacking the football right now. Defensively, we're creating turnovers and
they're having a lot of fun. I don't I don't
(01:44):
remember our guys celebrating the way our guys are celebrating
one another right now when they're making great plays, and
so that part's encouraging. I think that's part of our team,
that's part of our culture right now. But I think
a lot of that is stemming from from what we're
doing defensively and the confidence that they're playing with.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
All right, And further with regard to the defense, somebody
asked him about you know, can you can you get batteries? Well,
of course, can get better. So how do you get
to that next gear so to speak, when you shift
an overdrive and get more production out of that defense?
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Well, you know, hopefully we can keep people out of
the end zone. You know, I think through three games,
it's like nineteen points, and I think I'm really frustrated
because we probably think it should still be at twelve.
You know, that was a take nothing away from UTSA.
But the run hits because we screwed something up and
then we couldn't get couldn't get the runner on the ground.
Speaker 1 (02:33):
He outran us.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
So you know, our our whole deal is if we
can stop the run and we can minimize the explosive
explosive pass plays and then create turnovers, and turnovers get
created a lot of different ways, you know, getting pressure
on the quarterback, forcing arrant throws, you know, sack fumbles,
things of that nature. Short fields, those are always areas
(02:54):
that you want more of, right and many times we
can get our hands on the ball, the better. The
more times we can affect the quarter the better. But
that all starts because we're stopping the run, and then
we're we're not giving people chunk yard plays, you know,
those chunk plays in the passing game.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
Back to the offense, and we saw Ryan Wingo have
the big run for fifty five yards on that speed
sweep against Michigan and boom he blows through for a
fifty one yard touchdown catch and runs. Who was asked
about Wingos development.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
You know, it's interesting about Ryan. He's he's got a
unique skill set. You know, you don't the size, the speed,
the range, you know, you don't find that every day.
But what he's brought from day one has been this
real sense of humility. You know, he he knows he's
not a finished product. He works really hard every day.
(03:44):
He keeps his mouth shut, he just works. You know,
it's not look at me, Ryan Wingo, It's what do
I need to do to improve Ryan Wingo? And so
the results of it's been I don't know if I've
ever been around a guy through three games that has
had the explosive play ability that he's possessed. It's been
every game he's created explosive plays, whether it's you know,
(04:05):
catching post routes, catching a short route turning it into
a long play, whether it's getting the reverse and creating
a long play. But but he'll tell you, Coach Jackson
would say he's not a finished product. Right, We're still
working on a lot of the details in his game.
But man, he definitely has a very, very bright future.
Speaker 1 (04:21):
All right. With regard to this whole thing of the
number one thing and the managing success. He talked about
the maturity level of the football team last week and
how it was important. He was asked about that again
with regard to managing the success of this team. My
(04:41):
thing is, I'm not going to change.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
You know, we've had a We've had a very consistent
messaging since the day I got here. And you know,
you always you have vision and goals of where your
program is going to be in the future. Uh, this
is what I was anticipating where we would be, and
it was probab be hard for a lot of other
people to see when you're five and seven. But we
had a vision and a goal of where our program
(05:06):
could be and the way we were going to get there,
and so the messaging has been very consistent. I just
don't think now's the time for me to start to change, right.
You know, We've got here because we're consistent. We've got
a formula for success that we believe in. I'm always
honest with our players. I'm very transparent with them, and
I think they appreciate that. And so that part's not
going to change either. But the key component to that
(05:28):
is better and never rests. Right. We have to continue
to try to improve because we're going to need better
play than we've had through three games to go try
to accomplish what we want to accomplish. And so we're
really more focused on our process than we are what
other people think of us.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
Right now.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
It's just about what are we going to do the
next opportunity that we get.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
Back to the ground game. Jayden Blue did not play
last Saturday. Is he was rehabbing that sore ankle. Remember
you actually finished the game against Michigan, but had gone
out for walking back in and then I was held
out of the game. So what is James Blues condition
and might he be able to go? And whether he
is able to go or not, how about the rest
(06:07):
of the running game.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Yeah, I think Jaden's making good progress right now. I'll
start with that. He's making good progress. Jolana McDonald's making
good progress. A couple guys that didn't play last week.
Hopefully we can get Jayden back. You know, he's an
impactful player for us, not only in the running game,
but in the passing game. And so you know, the
run game for us has been unique because I think
we're blocking some stuff really really well at the line
(06:31):
of scrimmage. Something we challenged the receivers on this morning
in my meeting was, I think we need to block
better on the perimeter. We need to get we need
to get hands and hats on safeties, and we got
to give our runners an opportunity to create really big runs.
But also I think some of that is you've got
a couple of new runners, and Trey and Jeric, they're
gonna find their comfort level in the open field.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
You know.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Jeric right now is kind of like a baby rhino.
He gets in the open field, he just kind of
puts his head down and runs right at somebody and
it's gonna be okay for him to make a guy miss,
you know, and try to score a touchdown. But right
now coach choices got him like red dot and something
and running right at it.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
You know.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
So but he's but we're blocking things, I think pretty
well at the line of scrimmage.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
Now.
Speaker 2 (07:13):
We to create those explosive runs. Our receivers got to
commit to it. It takes all eleven in the run game.
And then I think our runners getting used to being
in the open field, especially, you know, Trey and and
Jeric who it's a little bit new to him right now.
Speaker 1 (07:25):
All right, Uh, there were some specifics asked about quinn Ewers,
and we heard a little bit about this from sarking
the post game show the other night. But they upon
looking at the video, how about the specificity of when
he saw yours take the hit?
Speaker 2 (07:39):
Yeah, it was the corner route to Gunner. So he throws,
you know, hits Gunner on the sideline, And honestly, that's
why nobody really saw it because we were all watching
Gunner hurdle the guy, you know, and everybody was kind
of oohing and on at Gunner all the while. On
the release, he just feels it, you know. And then
to his point, and I think what he thought was
(08:01):
it was just gonna kind of go away, so he
stayed in for one more play and then realized, I
probably need to get this looked at.
Speaker 1 (08:06):
This doesn't feel right. So that was the simplest explanation
on that. All right. Back to the Running game. You know,
here's Jered Gibson, who's a freshman. And when Gibson came
in along with Christian Clark was like, hey, running back
room is talented, but it is a little crowded because
you have Jade Blue and remember able to see j
(08:28):
Baxter and Blue at the starts along with Tray Weisner.
And then of course Baxter goes out with the knee injury,
Christian Clark goes out with the achilles injury, so they're
both done for the year. So then it became okay,
now we're going to go ahead and move Ryan Niblett
(08:49):
from the slot receiver into the backfield but also as receiver,
let him kind of cross train in those and then
they went and got Velton Gardner, the grad transfer from SMU. So,
you know, if you're a freshman maybe wondering, hey, you know,
am I going to get my opportunity? And we've seen
Jared Gibson get the opportunity. So the question for Sark
(09:10):
was how do you keep a freshman running back patient
through all of this process until it is indeed truly
his time.
Speaker 2 (09:18):
Yeah, No, I think it's I think it's difficult at
any position, and that one is difficult because you know
you're getting the ball at running back receivers different because
you may play thirty five snaps and the ball just
doesn't come your way when you when you're playing running back.
You know, hey, they're handing me the ball on this play,
and so it's a little bit different mentality. I think
(09:39):
Coach Choice does a fantastic job with that. He coaches
them all like they're all getting twenty five carries on Saturday.
He doesn't pick and choose how he coaches one guy
to the next. You know, he coaches them hard. He's
demanding of them, and I think that's why they're ready
when they're when their opportunities do come their way.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
All right. A couple other thoughts from Sark Uh when
talking about again, there were gonna be a lot of
questions about Arch banning and his performance. He was asked
about his decision making, you know, the run instead of
the pass, and you know when to pull it down
and check downs and looking at his two and three
(10:16):
receivers and looking over the defense, reading the defense, in
other words, decision making. How did sark evaluate Arch's decision
making once he was on the field.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
Yeah, No, I thought Arch really made good decisions Saturday.
Obviously it was very efficient day. I think he was
like nine to twelve and even his first play in
that was the third read. You know, DeAndrea was his
third read. We were actually trying to get I think
it was Isaiah Bond in the flat. They guarded him.
Then he was Then we were trying to hit Gunner
(10:48):
on a corner. They guarded him, and then he found
you know, DeAndre on the over route. So that was
encouraging his first play in he was getting to kind
of his third read. But I thought the ball was
really going to the right people. You know, I thought
he kind of missed a throw to to DeAndre Moore
a little bit later on kind of a corner route.
You know, just just hey, human nature sometimes we don't
(11:08):
throw it perfect. And then you know, got pressured on
the on the backed up throw. We were trying to
hit the ball down our sidelines and so the ball
was you know, looked errant, but it was really just
got hit on it. But the other thing was encouraging.
Like I showed the team today, we talked about being
a physical football team, and it's hard to quantify a
quarterback being physical. But on the touchdown pass to Ryan Wingo,
(11:31):
he takes a really good shot. You know, the two
guys come and hit him late on the delivery, but
he's able to stand in there. He didn't flinch and
he delivered, you know, deliver the touchdown pass. So definitely
encouraged by that. You know, both times he pulled the
ball to run, was the right decision to do that.
I know the second time we didn't block it great
on the perimeter, but he made good decisions even in
(11:51):
that realm of when to pull it and when to
hand the ball off.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
Also, Sark was asked about you know Quinn. They said that,
you know, you mentioned they was going to be questionable
during the SEC Conference opening week. This week, he's questionable,
questionable for this week. Okay, yeah, there, it is, just
making sure he's also questionable for this week today's game.
(12:16):
Is there a road map, so to speak, for freshmen
and how they deal with you know, everything that happens
to them as student athletes is college football players being
in a program like Texas. Is there any sort of
guidelines that he tries to give to these guys so
(12:37):
that they can improve and that they can you know,
progress at the pace that he wants to see them do. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (12:45):
No, I mean I think that's important for every freshman,
whether they're a Calvin Banks who started as a true freshman,
or a Cedric Baxter or a guy like a gun
or Helm, you know, in his journey. Right, every guy
that comes into our program, we're all always trying to
help develop them of you know, identify where they're at,
the things they do well, and if they are going
(13:05):
to play, try to put them in position to do
the things they do well early on to gain confidence.
All the while, we've got this whole other list of
things that we need them to improve upon, and that's
what we work on in practice. And then we start
to take the stuff that they're improving upon and start
putting it in that bucket of the things that they
do well. The things that you can do well, the
more opportunities that you can get when you're on the
field to play. And so you know, we do try
(13:28):
to identify those things, we try to work on them
with it. We try to get them to gain some
confidence and doing that and for some guys that might
be on special teams and maybe that's a way to
get some confidence of covering kicks and things of that nature.
So but that's the fun part of coaching. You know
that a lot of times people don't get to see,
but the players start to see it. You know, it's
It's like the person who starts working out and eat
(13:50):
and right. You know that, you know they're looking in
the mirror every day, and that's that slow transformation and
then all of a sudden they go outside and people
are like, wow, I can't believe how much you've changed.
So as much as the people the public might be
seeing where they're at today, we've been seeing the work
those guys have been putting in every single day in practice.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
Yeah, that makes a difference as well. And one more
from Sark and then we'll hear some more from him
coming up next hour. Mobility. We talked about this on
the broadcast the other night, and you know Sart always
wants his quarterbacks to be mobile. And something else that
(14:29):
has happened is when reporters have asked him questions when
they wanted him to compare a particular player, they you know,
immediately go back to places where he had other success
Washington USC and asked for comparisons with them, whether it
(14:53):
be body type or speed or ability to navigate their position,
things like that. The same thing happened with the quarterback
question also for Sark and mobility and where that rates
in terms of his quarterback's mobility in comparison with others.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
Well, it's always you know, we are of the adage, right,
you guys have heard me say this. The more things
we can do really well, I feel like the tougher
we are to defend. And that's you know, the run game,
the RPO, the play action pass, the screen game, the
drop back pass.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
Well, now we'll senden.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
We have this element of quarterback run that we can
add kind of to the twist too. We'll never major
in that, I'll be honest with you. I don't think
we're ever going to walk out here and our quarterback
is going to carry the ball, you know, ten to
twenty times a game. And that's just not who a
lot of ways to skin a cat. That's not the
way we like to do it. But that doesn't mean
we can't utilize it some critical moments to keep people honest.
(15:46):
And so that's kind of how we'll kind of move
going forward. You know, I had a guy that could
run run when I was at Washington, by name of
Jake Locker, and he was a physical guy like art
really kind of put together well, but he was a
real runner, you know, and at that time, we weren't
very good and so I had to run him and
(16:08):
it probably wasn't fair to me, but he got beat
up some along the way. But you know, physically, that's
probably the best comparison, you know. But that's that's about it.
Speaker 1 (16:18):
Okay, it's some other way to think about it. I
remember on an open date weekend for Texas seeing taking
my at the time, I guess he was eight eight
year old son to see Jake Locker and Washington coached
by Sark against Notre Dame which had Jimmy clawson and
(16:43):
was the heck of a football game, went overtime. What
a quarterback matchup? Yeah, it was. It was good and
it went over time and Notre Dame ended up winning
the game in overtime and at times an absolute drenching downpour,
but we had a good time on that, all right.
Coming up, we'll talk some more NFL notes next here
on sports Radio AM thirteen nunder Zone of the iHeartRadio app.
We're back.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
It's the Craig Way Show with Hall of Fame broadcaster
and voice of the Texas Longhearts Craig Way.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Is this music selection supposed to be some sort of
statement on my advancing age? Is that today being the
birthday and there's some sort of a funeral dirge or
something like that, you feel a little melancholy today. There's
some days when I do feel older than others. Feel
good today though, and with good reason and glad to
(00:37):
be with you here on this Monday afternoon. Let's go
back to hearing some from Long Worn's head coach Steve Sarkeishan.
He was talking about the offense last hour. Let's talk
a little bit. First of all, we'll talk about some defense.
He was asked about how his defensive staff has become
so cohesive so quickly in the addition of Johnny Nansen
(00:58):
and everything that's going on with the defensive staff. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
No, I think our defensive staff has done a tremendous job.
You know, we've we've adjusted some defensively from where we were,
and we've we've kind of evolved each year into where
we where we've gone from one year to the next,
And I think they've done a nice job. I think
the addition of Johnny Nansen coming on board has been
helpful with with PK and bouncing some new ideas off
(01:23):
of each other. But more importantly is I think that
our guys are playing a style of football that I'm
excited about. We play hard, we play fast, we play
physical defense. You know, we tackle really really well. We're
attacking the football right now. Defensively, we're creating turnovers and
they're having a lot of fun. I don't I don't
(01:44):
remember our guys celebrating the way our guys are celebrating
one another right now when they're making great plays, and
so that part's encouraging. I think that's part of our team,
that's part of our culture right now. But I think
a lot of that is stemming from from what we're
doing defensively and the confidence that they're playing with.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
All right, And further with regard to the defense, somebody
asked him about you know, can you can you get batteries? Well,
of course, can get better. So how do you get
to that next gear so to speak, when you shift
an overdrive and get more production out of that defense?
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Well, you know, hopefully we can keep people out of
the end zone. You know, I think through three games,
it's like nineteen points, and I think I'm really frustrated
because we probably think it should still be at twelve.
You know, that was a take nothing away from UTSA.
But the run hits because we screwed something up and
then we couldn't get couldn't get the runner on the ground.
Speaker 1 (02:33):
He outran us.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
So you know, our our whole deal is if we
can stop the run and we can minimize the explosive
explosive pass plays and then create turnovers, and turnovers get
created a lot of different ways, you know, getting pressure
on the quarterback, forcing arrant throws, you know, sack fumbles,
things of that nature. Short fields, those are always areas
(02:54):
that you want more of, right and many times we
can get our hands on the ball, the better. The
more times we can affect the quarter the better. But
that all starts because we're stopping the run, and then
we're we're not giving people chunk yard plays, you know,
those chunk plays in the passing game.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
Back to the offense, and we saw Ryan Wingo have
the big run for fifty five yards on that speed
sweep against Michigan and boom he blows through for a
fifty one yard touchdown catch and runs. Who was asked
about Wingos development.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
You know, it's interesting about Ryan. He's he's got a
unique skill set. You know, you don't the size, the speed,
the range, you know, you don't find that every day.
But what he's brought from day one has been this
real sense of humility. You know, he he knows he's
not a finished product. He works really hard every day.
(03:44):
He keeps his mouth shut, he just works. You know,
it's not look at me, Ryan Wingo, It's what do
I need to do to improve Ryan Wingo? And so
the results of it's been I don't know if I've
ever been around a guy through three games that has
had the explosive play ability that he's possessed. It's been
every game he's created explosive plays, whether it's you know,
(04:05):
catching post routes, catching a short route turning it into
a long play, whether it's getting the reverse and creating
a long play. But but he'll tell you, Coach Jackson
would say he's not a finished product. Right, We're still
working on a lot of the details in his game.
But man, he definitely has a very, very bright future.
Speaker 1 (04:21):
All right. With regard to this whole thing of the
number one thing and the managing success. He talked about
the maturity level of the football team last week and
how it was important. He was asked about that again
with regard to managing the success of this team. My
(04:41):
thing is, I'm not going to change.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
You know, we've had a We've had a very consistent
messaging since the day I got here. And you know,
you always you have vision and goals of where your
program is going to be in the future. Uh, this
is what I was anticipating where we would be, and
it was probab be hard for a lot of other
people to see when you're five and seven. But we
had a vision and a goal of where our program
(05:06):
could be and the way we were going to get there,
and so the messaging has been very consistent. I just
don't think now's the time for me to start to change, right.
You know, We've got here because we're consistent. We've got
a formula for success that we believe in. I'm always
honest with our players. I'm very transparent with them, and
I think they appreciate that. And so that part's not
going to change either. But the key component to that
(05:28):
is better and never rests. Right. We have to continue
to try to improve because we're going to need better
play than we've had through three games to go try
to accomplish what we want to accomplish. And so we're
really more focused on our process than we are what
other people think of us.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
Right now.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
It's just about what are we going to do the
next opportunity that we get.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
Back to the ground game. Jayden Blue did not play
last Saturday. Is he was rehabbing that sore ankle. Remember
you actually finished the game against Michigan, but had gone
out for walking back in and then I was held
out of the game. So what is James Blues condition
and might he be able to go? And whether he
is able to go or not, how about the rest
(06:07):
of the running game.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Yeah, I think Jaden's making good progress right now. I'll
start with that. He's making good progress. Jolana McDonald's making
good progress. A couple guys that didn't play last week.
Hopefully we can get Jayden back. You know, he's an
impactful player for us, not only in the running game,
but in the passing game. And so you know, the
run game for us has been unique because I think
we're blocking some stuff really really well at the line
(06:31):
of scrimmage. Something we challenged the receivers on this morning
in my meeting was, I think we need to block
better on the perimeter. We need to get we need
to get hands and hats on safeties, and we got
to give our runners an opportunity to create really big runs.
But also I think some of that is you've got
a couple of new runners, and Trey and Jeric, they're
gonna find their comfort level in the open field.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
You know.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Jeric right now is kind of like a baby rhino.
He gets in the open field, he just kind of
puts his head down and runs right at somebody and
it's gonna be okay for him to make a guy miss,
you know, and try to score a touchdown. But right
now coach choices got him like red dot and something
and running right at it.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
You know.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
So but he's but we're blocking things, I think pretty
well at the line of scrimmage.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
Now.
Speaker 2 (07:13):
We to create those explosive runs. Our receivers got to
commit to it. It takes all eleven in the run game.
And then I think our runners getting used to being
in the open field, especially, you know, Trey and and
Jeric who it's a little bit new to him right now.
Speaker 1 (07:25):
All right, Uh, there were some specifics asked about quinn Ewers,
and we heard a little bit about this from sarking
the post game show the other night. But they upon
looking at the video, how about the specificity of when
he saw yours take the hit?
Speaker 2 (07:39):
Yeah, it was the corner route to Gunner. So he throws,
you know, hits Gunner on the sideline, And honestly, that's
why nobody really saw it because we were all watching
Gunner hurdle the guy, you know, and everybody was kind
of oohing and on at Gunner all the while. On
the release, he just feels it, you know. And then
to his point, and I think what he thought was
(08:01):
it was just gonna kind of go away, so he
stayed in for one more play and then realized, I
probably need to get this looked at.
Speaker 1 (08:06):
This doesn't feel right. So that was the simplest explanation
on that. All right. Back to the Running game. You know,
here's Jered Gibson, who's a freshman. And when Gibson came
in along with Christian Clark was like, hey, running back
room is talented, but it is a little crowded because
you have Jade Blue and remember able to see j
(08:28):
Baxter and Blue at the starts along with Tray Weisner.
And then of course Baxter goes out with the knee injury,
Christian Clark goes out with the achilles injury, so they're
both done for the year. So then it became okay,
now we're going to go ahead and move Ryan Niblett
(08:49):
from the slot receiver into the backfield but also as receiver,
let him kind of cross train in those and then
they went and got Velton Gardner, the grad transfer from SMU. So,
you know, if you're a freshman maybe wondering, hey, you know,
am I going to get my opportunity? And we've seen
Jared Gibson get the opportunity. So the question for Sark
(09:10):
was how do you keep a freshman running back patient
through all of this process until it is indeed truly
his time.
Speaker 2 (09:18):
Yeah, No, I think it's I think it's difficult at
any position, and that one is difficult because you know
you're getting the ball at running back receivers different because
you may play thirty five snaps and the ball just
doesn't come your way when you when you're playing running back.
You know, hey, they're handing me the ball on this play,
and so it's a little bit different mentality. I think
(09:39):
Coach Choice does a fantastic job with that. He coaches
them all like they're all getting twenty five carries on Saturday.
He doesn't pick and choose how he coaches one guy
to the next. You know, he coaches them hard. He's
demanding of them, and I think that's why they're ready
when they're when their opportunities do come their way.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
All right. A couple other thoughts from Sark Uh when
talking about again, there were gonna be a lot of
questions about Arch banning and his performance. He was asked
about his decision making, you know, the run instead of
the pass, and you know when to pull it down
and check downs and looking at his two and three
(10:16):
receivers and looking over the defense, reading the defense, in
other words, decision making. How did sark evaluate Arch's decision
making once he was on the field.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
Yeah, No, I thought Arch really made good decisions Saturday.
Obviously it was very efficient day. I think he was
like nine to twelve and even his first play in
that was the third read. You know, DeAndrea was his
third read. We were actually trying to get I think
it was Isaiah Bond in the flat. They guarded him.
Then he was Then we were trying to hit Gunner
(10:48):
on a corner. They guarded him, and then he found
you know, DeAndre on the over route. So that was
encouraging his first play in he was getting to kind
of his third read. But I thought the ball was
really going to the right people. You know, I thought
he kind of missed a throw to to DeAndre Moore
a little bit later on kind of a corner route.
You know, just just hey, human nature sometimes we don't
(11:08):
throw it perfect. And then you know, got pressured on
the on the backed up throw. We were trying to
hit the ball down our sidelines and so the ball
was you know, looked errant, but it was really just
got hit on it. But the other thing was encouraging.
Like I showed the team today, we talked about being
a physical football team, and it's hard to quantify a
quarterback being physical. But on the touchdown pass to Ryan Wingo,
(11:31):
he takes a really good shot. You know, the two
guys come and hit him late on the delivery, but
he's able to stand in there. He didn't flinch and
he delivered, you know, deliver the touchdown pass. So definitely
encouraged by that. You know, both times he pulled the
ball to run, was the right decision to do that.
I know the second time we didn't block it great
on the perimeter, but he made good decisions even in
(11:51):
that realm of when to pull it and when to
hand the ball off.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
Also, Sark was asked about you know Quinn. They said that,
you know, you mentioned they was going to be questionable
during the SEC Conference opening week. This week, he's questionable,
questionable for this week. Okay, yeah, there, it is, just
making sure he's also questionable for this week today's game.
(12:16):
Is there a road map, so to speak, for freshmen
and how they deal with you know, everything that happens
to them as student athletes is college football players being
in a program like Texas. Is there any sort of
guidelines that he tries to give to these guys so
(12:37):
that they can improve and that they can you know,
progress at the pace that he wants to see them do. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (12:45):
No, I mean I think that's important for every freshman,
whether they're a Calvin Banks who started as a true freshman,
or a Cedric Baxter or a guy like a gun
or Helm, you know, in his journey. Right, every guy
that comes into our program, we're all always trying to
help develop them of you know, identify where they're at,
the things they do well, and if they are going
(13:05):
to play, try to put them in position to do
the things they do well early on to gain confidence.
All the while, we've got this whole other list of
things that we need them to improve upon, and that's
what we work on in practice. And then we start
to take the stuff that they're improving upon and start
putting it in that bucket of the things that they
do well. The things that you can do well, the
more opportunities that you can get when you're on the
field to play. And so you know, we do try
(13:28):
to identify those things, we try to work on them
with it. We try to get them to gain some
confidence and doing that and for some guys that might
be on special teams and maybe that's a way to
get some confidence of covering kicks and things of that nature.
So but that's the fun part of coaching. You know
that a lot of times people don't get to see,
but the players start to see it. You know, it's
It's like the person who starts working out and eat
(13:50):
and right. You know that, you know they're looking in
the mirror every day, and that's that slow transformation and
then all of a sudden they go outside and people
are like, wow, I can't believe how much you've changed.
So as much as the people the public might be
seeing where they're at today, we've been seeing the work
those guys have been putting in every single day in practice.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
Yeah, that makes a difference as well. And one more
from Sark and then we'll hear some more from him
coming up next hour. Mobility. We talked about this on
the broadcast the other night, and you know Sart always
wants his quarterbacks to be mobile. And something else that
(14:29):
has happened is when reporters have asked him questions when
they wanted him to compare a particular player, they you know,
immediately go back to places where he had other success
Washington USC and asked for comparisons with them, whether it
(14:53):
be body type or speed or ability to navigate their position,
things like that. The same thing happened with the quarterback
question also for Sark and mobility and where that rates
in terms of his quarterback's mobility in comparison with others.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
Well, it's always you know, we are of the adage, right,
you guys have heard me say this. The more things
we can do really well, I feel like the tougher
we are to defend. And that's you know, the run game,
the RPO, the play action pass, the screen game, the
drop back pass.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
Well, now we'll senden.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
We have this element of quarterback run that we can
add kind of to the twist too. We'll never major
in that, I'll be honest with you. I don't think
we're ever going to walk out here and our quarterback
is going to carry the ball, you know, ten to
twenty times a game. And that's just not who a
lot of ways to skin a cat. That's not the
way we like to do it. But that doesn't mean
we can't utilize it some critical moments to keep people honest.
(15:46):
And so that's kind of how we'll kind of move
going forward. You know, I had a guy that could
run run when I was at Washington, by name of
Jake Locker, and he was a physical guy like art
really kind of put together well, but he was a
real runner, you know, and at that time, we weren't
very good and so I had to run him and
(16:08):
it probably wasn't fair to me, but he got beat
up some along the way. But you know, physically, that's
probably the best comparison, you know. But that's that's about it.
Speaker 1 (16:18):
Okay, it's some other way to think about it. I
remember on an open date weekend for Texas seeing taking
my at the time, I guess he was eight eight
year old son to see Jake Locker and Washington coached
by Sark against Notre Dame which had Jimmy clawson and
(16:43):
was the heck of a football game, went overtime. What
a quarterback matchup? Yeah, it was. It was good and
it went over time and Notre Dame ended up winning
the game in overtime and at times an absolute drenching downpour,
but we had a good time on that, all right.
Coming up, we'll talk some more NFL notes next here
on sports Radio AM thirteen nunder Zone of the iHeartRadio app.
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