Changes are staring Texas in the face after another ugly Saturday.
Steve Sarkisian’s Longhorns followed one embarrassing loss with another, falling 27-24 to unranked Florida and dropping into a mess that now feels bigger than one bad afternoon. Texas took a 17-3 lead in the first half, looked like it had the game under control, and still found a way to let Florida chip away and finish the job against a Texas offense that never did enough to separate.
The result leaves Texas at 4-2 with a brutal stretch ahead: No. 9 Ole Miss, No.
16 Mississippi State, at No. 13 Missouri and at No.
22 LSU. CBS Sports’ projections now peg the Longhorns’ playoff odds at 43 percent after the loss to a Florida team that had dropped its previous two games by more than 20 points and was starting its backup quarterback.
Missing the 12-team playoff again, after all the money and hype poured into this roster, would be a major failure.
The bigger issue is that nothing about this offense is functioning at the level Texas needs. The play-calling has been poor.
The quarterback play has been poor. The roster construction, for all the preseason noise around it, has not delivered.
Arch Manning is right in the middle of it. Instead of looking like the future No. 1 overall pick some had talked about before the season, he now looks far more likely to be benched.
He still flashes the kind of play that makes you sit up - usually when the situation is at its toughest - but his confidence appears shaken, and the offense around him has too little juice. With players like Ryan Wingo, Cam Coleman and Hollywood Smothers around him, Texas should be getting far more explosiveness than it is.
Right now, Manning does not look like a quarterback who can push this team to its preseason national championship goal.
"Arch, you don't know what you're going to get," an SEC head coach told CBS Sports. "Whether it's good Arch or Dazed and Confused Arch."
After the game, Sarkisian didn’t duck the issue. He said everything would be evaluated, including the quarterback position.
"We're going to evaluate everything," Sarkisian said. "I don't know how many times I need to say it.
We're going to evaluate everything from an offensive perspective. Part of that is play-calling."
The play-calling question is impossible to ignore now. Texas entered Saturday averaging just 3.66 yards per carry, which ranked 117th nationally, and its offense had the worst three-and-out rate in the SEC at nearly 29 percent. Sarkisian’s reputation is built on offense, but the product on the field simply hasn’t matched it.
That also raises a harder question inside the building: who on this staff is actually in position to fix it? Quarterbacks coach A.J.
Milwee? Offensive line coach and offensive-coordinator-in-name-only Kyle Flood?
Both have become part of the problem, not an obvious answer. Sarkisian’s loyalty to longtime assistants like Milwee, Flood and special teams coordinator Jeff Banks has become a real issue, especially with multiple units underachieving and Texas unable to develop two QB recruits.
The cleanest fix might not come until the offseason, but it feels unavoidable. Texas needs a serious shakeup on offense, along with new ideas and a different kind of energy.
If Sarkisian is going to keep his job, athletic director Chris Del Conte may need to make that a condition. Sarkisian’s $50 million buyout is hefty, but manageable enough at Texas that Del Conte has leverage if he wants to use it.
The standards have to change, too, not just the personnel. Del Conte’s strongly worded statement earlier this season made clear that accountability is already under scrutiny.
If Sarkisian is willing to alter his approach and bring in a real offensive coordinator he trusts to run the show, there’s a route back to success in 2027. If he stays stubborn and refuses to move on from his friends, Del Conte will have a decision to make about whether Sarkisian is the right coach to finally push Texas over the top.
The 2024 season disappointed.
The 2025 season has been worse.
And the way things are going, it’s getting even more dangerous.
Can Sarkisian stop the slide?
He’s going to have to change to do it.
In Other News...
Florida's Win At Texas Just Changed The Gators' Postseason Outlook
Floridas Week 7 win at Texas gave the Gators more than a marquee road result. It also showed up in the numbers, with ESPNs Football Power Index lifting Florida six spots to No. 19 and nudging the teams projected regular-season finish to 7.7-4.3. For a program still trying to build momentum, a jump like that is a meaningful sign that the path forward is looking a little brighter.
Floridas improved outlook now stretches beyond the win column, too. The Gators odds of running the table, reaching the College Football Playoff and even contending for the conference all ticked upward after the upset in Austin, a reminder that one big victory can reshape the rest of a season. The FPI top 25 after Week 7 reflects how much movement came from the weekend, and Florida suddenly sits in a more interesting spot than it did before kickoff. [Read more 🡒]
London Montgomery Gave Florida The Spark It Desperately Needed
For a Florida team that needed a jolt, London Montgomery supplied it in all the right places against Texas. The senior running back and kick returner was a steady presence in the Gators' 27-24 win, giving the offense a little breathing room with four carries for 20 yards while also tilting the field on special teams. His five kick returns totaled 105 yards, and the hidden value of those touches showed up in the way Florida was able to build better starting positions and keep drives moving toward the end zone.
Montgomery's impact was less about one explosive highlight than the kind of complementary play every team needs in a tight game. Florida has been searching for more spark, and he helped provide it by turning routine special-teams snaps into momentum and by giving the offense a chance to operate without constantly working uphill. In a three-point game, those margins mattered, and Montgomery made them count. [Read more 🡒]
Florida Is Back In The Poll Debate After A Statement Win
Floridas statement win over Texas has the Gators back in the conversation for the Top 25, the kind of result that can reshape how a season is viewed almost overnight. A 24-27 road win carries real weight in a crowded college football landscape, especially with several notable teams, including Indiana and Notre Dame, seeing their winning streaks snapped in the same stretch.
For Florida, the timing matters as much as the result. Projected rankings are already starting to reflect the shift, and the Gators now sit in the middle of the weekly poll debate where rsum, momentum and perception can move quickly after a weekend like this. The bigger question is how far the climb goes once the full Top 25 picture settles in. [Read more 🡒]