Texas Longhorns head coach Steve Sarkisian wasted no time rallying his team as underdogs in their upcoming CFP semifinal showdown against the Ohio State Buckeyes.
With the majority of fans and analysts favoring the Buckeyes (along with Vegas), Sarkisian is embracing the “us against the world” mentality and is hoping his team will do the same come Friday night.
The Longhorns earned their spot in the semifinals with a thrilling double-overtime win against the Arizona State Sun Devils on New Year’s Day.
Meanwhile, Ohio State made a bold statement by overpowering the Oregon Ducks in the Rose Bowl.
The vast majority of the college football world has always known just how talented of a team Ohio State is. Now, they are finally living up to their sky-high hype and the Columbus bandwagon is getting full.
Sark and company are eating all of it up.
With all of the pressure and expectations sitting squarely on Ohio State’s shoulders, the Longhorns are enjoying the new underdog role they now find themselves in.
“Clearly, we’re massive underdogs. Nobody’s going to give us a shot. So we’re going to need all that we can to try to win this game,” Sarkisian said.
Sarkisian went on to praise Ohio State, calling them the “best team in college football,” and emphasized the challenges his team faces in halting their potent offense, led by quarterback Will Howard and their lethal receiving core.
He outlined the defensive strategy necessary to contain the Buckeyesโ aggressive attack.
“We’ve gotta be really good at the line of scrimmage against the run and the pass. Ohio State is similar to us that way. When they have balance, they’re very difficult. Gotta be good against the run. We gotta try to affect him in the pocket, and we need to disrupt timing in the back end,” Sarkisian said.
“We need to disguise our coverages well. We need to be sticky in coverage. We need to get hands on footballs. We need to make throwing lanes difficult. We need to get our hands up at the line of scrimmage. There’s a lot of factors to that. Not an easy task, I’ll say that, but one that I think is necessary if we want to be successful.”
The Longhorns’ success could also hinge on the performance of quarterback Quinn Ewers, who will need to deliver under pressure.
Considering all of the unwarranted criticism he takes, Ewers is one of the most underappreciated players in all of college football.
While Texas’ ground game will be ultra-important, Ewers will be called upon several times to be key throws in the passing game. Whether or not he delivers will go a long ways towards deciding the outcome.
The Cotton Bowl matchup between Texas and Ohio State will kickoff this Friday evening at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas.
The winner will advance on to the national championship game where they will face the victor of tomorrow’s Orange Bowl matchup between Notre Dame and Penn State.
What are your thoughts on Sark playing up the “no one believes in us” angle?
More importantly, what’s your prediction for the game? … Can you see the Longhorns “shocking the world” (sarcasm) and pulling off the upset???
