Sonny Dykes has already drawn the line himself: TCU is “a good football program on the verge of being a great program.” After back-to-back 9-4 seasons, the Horned Frogs have steadied things well beyond the six-win average from the final Gary Patterson years.
But for a fan base that still remembers the 2022 run to the national title game, that only goes so far. Good has been the baseline.
Great is still the goal.
That’s the standard hanging over a season that opens Aug. 29 in Dublin against North Carolina and could end up defining the Dykes era. And this one feels different before a snap is even played.
The biggest sign of that shift came when Dykes made a move he had never made in Fort Worth: he went outside his own coaching circle for a coordinator. When Kendal Briles left for South Carolina in December, the expectation was another Air Raid mind with Texas connections. Instead, Dykes hired UConn’s Gordon Sammis, a coach he had never worked with and one with no direct link to his tree.
The story of how Dykes found him sounds almost accidental. While channel-surfing in a team hotel on Nov. 1, 2024, the night before the Baylor game, he landed on UConn-Georgia State and saw the Huskies run for 271 yards. He kept watching.
“Gordie reminds me a lot of myself when I was a coordinator,” Dykes said. “They didn’t have a lot of penalties, they didn’t have a lot of turnovers, and they had a good scheme. It reminded me a little bit of the scheme we ran when I was in Arizona as coordinator.”
That kind of departure was the point. “We need to be different,” Dykes said.
“The guys you know a lot of times are guys you’ve worked with and share your philosophy. We needed to step outside our comfort zone a little bit … I could have hired about 25 guys that I know, that I worked with, but I felt like we needed something different.”
What TCU gets from Sammis is not a full stylistic overhaul, but a sharper edge. Sammis described the offense as “a pro-style set … tailored to what we have personnel-wise.
We’re going to have RPOs, zone reads, you name it. There’s going to be more of an NFL flavor in terms of dropbacks.”
That means more three-tight-end looks, more snaps under center, more motion, more shifting before the ball is snapped. It also means an offense built around efficiency and cleaner quarterback reads.
The timing matters, too. The Big 12 has moved toward physical line play, and Texas Tech and BYU won the league last year by leaning into that instead of trying to outgun everybody.
At quarterback, TCU is betting on a fresh face. Josh Hoover ranked fourth nationally in passing yards per game last season, but a week after Sammis was hired on Dec.
11, Hoover entered the portal and ended up at defending national champion Indiana. The Frogs didn’t chase a headline grab like DJ Lagway or Kenny Minchey.
They landed Harvard transfer Jaden Craig, with Sammis driving the pursuit.
Craig has the frame and tools TCU wanted at 6-foot-3 and 225 pounds, with arm strength and mobility that fit the new system. Sammis said at the start of camp, “I’m pleased with his progress.
He works really hard,” and added, “I’ll walk into my office, and he’s in there watching tape. He’s on it all the time.
It’s like coaching a guy with a pro mentality, and that’s what he wants to be.”
Dykes sees a quarterback who can do more than just distribute the ball. “He moves well.
There will be enough things to move him out of the pocket, and that helps your pass protection. He throws on the run exceptionally well … He’s got a big arm, so obviously we want to make sure we get the ball down the field.”
Craig sees the fit, too. “I think he’s such a bright football mind. I’ve already learned a ton from him … It’s a pro-style offense, it gives me a lot of responsibilities.”
The receiving room has a clear headliner in Jordan Dwyer, who arrived from Idaho and immediately produced 730 yards and seven touchdowns in his first Power Four season while defenses paid attention to Eric McAlister. Malcolm Kelly has built a reputation for developing receivers, with Quentin Johnston, Savion Williams and Eric McAlister among his recent success stories, and Dwyer looks like the next one.
“Jordan Dwyer has been everything we asked him to be and more,” Kelly said. “From blocking on the perimeter to mixing it up, moving him all over the field, putting him on different option plays - he’s winning at all three levels consistently.”
Sammis intends to keep Dwyer moving around the formation, lining him up outside, in the slot and in motion so he can keep getting touches. He is the clear top target and also the de facto leader in a room built around younger players such as sophomore Ed Small, redshirt sophomores Jeremy Scott and Dozie Ezukanma, and redshirt freshman Terry Shelton.
Dwyer knows what TCU’s receiver pipeline can do. Since 2022, the program has sent Quentin Johnston, Savion Williams, Jack Bech and Derius Davis to the NFL.
“It’s obviously everything you want as a player to be in that role. But it’s really just about taking it day by day,” he said.
On Sammis, Dwyer was even more direct: “Oh it’s great, I love it. Sammis, he’s got the special sauce.”
The tight end room should also be a real piece of this offense. Rogers, who posted 34 catches for 319 yards and two touchdowns and is now with the Cowboys, is gone, and Chase Curtis’s departure left the group without a senior. Redshirt juniors Ka’Morreun Pimpton and Lafayette Kaiuway are the veterans now, while junior Kari Ashley - a transfer from Navarro College by way of Georgia Tech, where a back injury led to a medical DQ - landed on Bruce Feldman’s Freaks List.
Tight ends coach Mitch Kirsch expects that size to matter. “These guys are 6-foot-6, 250, 260 pounds, and run really well.
They shouldn’t be able to be covered by a DB.” With Sammis leaning pro-style, heavy 12 and 13 personnel looks should be part of the package.
Then came the late-camp hit on defense. Senior free safety Jacob Fields, last year’s Conference USA Defensive Player of the Year at Louisiana Tech, was dismissed for a violation of team rules, the program announced. Fields had been TCU’s answer to replacing All-Big 12 safety and second-round draft pick Bud Clark, and he had flashed throughout camp with interceptions and splash plays.
Now senior Jordan Lester gets the job. He has spent three seasons learning behind Clark, and the Dublin opener gives him his first real stage.
TCU’s 2026 slate starts in Dublin on Aug. 29 against North Carolina at 11 a.m. on ESPN. Grambling State comes to Fort Worth on Sept. 12, followed by Arkansas State on Sept.
- The Frogs then head to UCF on Sept. 26 before the Big 12 grind begins with BYU on Oct.
3, Baylor on Oct. 17, West Virginia on Oct.
24, Kansas on Oct. 31, Arizona on Nov.
6, Kansas State on Nov. 14, Utah on Nov. 21 and Texas Tech on Nov.
The home games against BYU, Kansas State and Utah stand out as the biggest league tests at Amon G. Carter.
The Black Friday trip to Lubbock could wind up carrying title-race weight. If Sammis’ offense clicks and Craig reaches his ceiling, TCU may finally have the ingredients to make Dykes’ line hold up: good turning into great.
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