Steve Sarkisian’s Indiana remarks may be the clearest sign yet of pressure at Texas

AUSTIN, Texas – Texas Longhorns head coach Steve Sarkisian is obsessed with who everyone else is playing. He recently complained about the Texas Tech Red Raiders’ Big 12 schedule and claimed he thinks Longhorns backups could go undefeated with it. Sark also defended James Franklin’s firing from the Penn State Nittany Lions midway through the 2025 season. Now, he’s giving a backhanded compliment to Curt Cignetti, the head coach of the defending national champion Indiana Hoosiers.

Sarkisian went on the “Always College Football” podcast and told Greg McElroy that teams shouldn’t be adopting everything about “the Indiana Way,” except scheduling easier non-conference opponents. The Hoosiers defeated the Old Dominion Monarchs, Kennesaw State Owls, and Indiana State Sycamores in their first three non-conference wins of the 2025 schedule.

“There’s a lot of ways to find the path to make it. Curt Cignetti, an amazing job at Indiana. What he’s done the last two years, there’s not a guy in our profession that can’t say, ‘What an unbelievable job.’ The way he did it has been somewhat unconventional with the sixth-year seniors, the transfers, the veteran group, the way they practice. All those things. But one thing in there, he adjusted their schedule, too. They’ve got a fresh team, they’re playing a lot of players early in the year, they’re a happy team,” Sarkisian said.

“We can’t, everybody, want to adopt the ‘Indiana Way’ but then, not adopt all of the ‘Indiana Way.’ But other people now are starting to follow suit. So to Coach Cignetti’s credit, everybody wants to impact our sport in some way, shape or form in a positive way. He’s impacting people because people now are starting to adjust their non-conference schedules because they’re seeing the value of another win as opposed to the value of the strength of your schedule.”

There was a lot of fluff, perhaps faux niceness in there to obfuscate the point of Sark’s message. Sarkisian was seemingly trying to imply that the 3-0 start to Indiana’s season was the main reason they ripped off 13 more, including three in the CFP against the Alabama Crimson Tide, Oregon Ducks, and Miami Hurricanes, and a Big Ten Championship Game against the Ohio State Buckeyes.

As if facing the Buckeyes in Week 1 last year caused losses to the Florida Gators and Georgia Bulldogs later in the season for the Longhorns.

Sarkisian is seemingly crying for help. Something is going on behind the scenes that’s causing these public outbursts about everyone’s schedule, plus Franklin being fired too soon, in Sark’s point of view, at least.

Steve Sarkisian must be feeling the heat in Austin

The summer months have brought the typical muggy heat, but it must be especially hot on the Forty Acres. Sarkisian has one of the most expensive rosters money can buy, but he’s coming off major regression in 2025 from two semifinal appearances the previous two CFPs, right as Arch Manning took the reins of the program.

Generational players like Manning define what the public zeitgeist’s opinion on your program will be, and the Longhorns lost two games by the end of September, while Manning struggled. Against the UTEP Miners, Manning had 10 straight incompletions. Sark is the play-caller. He should be able to scheme a dominant game for Manning against UTEP, no?

Sarkisian must feel deep down that one of the team’s weaknesses, perhaps the interior offensive line at the guard spots, perhaps the depth at linebacker, could result in another CFP-less campaign. Ohio State, the neutral-field Red River Rivalry game against the Oklahoma Sooners, the LSU Tigers in Death Valley, and the Lone Star Showdown against the Texas A&M Aggies at Kyle Field are all losable games, on paper.

Jamaal Charles hinted at the behind-closed-doors politics at UT Austin when we spoke last October at the 2025 Red River Rivalry game. With the Manning element added, and a transfer portal class that saw elite receiving threat Cam Coleman and running backs Hollywood Smothers and Raleek Bown join the offense to maximize the former 5-star QB’s final year in Central Texas, Sarkisian’s public frustrations hint at something troubling going on at the MNAC day-to-day.