In this age of college football,
defensive superteams make the game
— and break it for others.
Texas isn’t immune to the effects of a powerful defense. Georgia and Ohio State, the two teams that eliminated any championship hopes from the Longhorns’ grasp, had the
fourth-best
and
overall-best
defenses in the nation, respectively.
But looking ahead, head coach Steve Sarkisian plans to turn the tide as Texas prepares to face both teams again.
“I think championships are won on the defensive side of the ball,” Sarkisian said. “We’ve got a defensive football team that we’re very excited about.”
For Sarkisian, this doesn’t seem to be a problem. He’s a masterful recruiter, bringing in
On3’s best-rated
2025 defensive class with five-star tackle Justus Terry, five-star safety Jonah Williams, five-star edge rusher Lance Jackson and five-star cornerback Kade Phillips, among others.
But even before the 2025 class arrived on the scene, Sarkisian’s defense had depth, and filling the shoes of those who left for the 2025 NFL Draft wasn’t a problem.
“This is probably the deepest and most talented defense that we’ve had,” Sarkisian said. “We’ve made incremental growth on the defensive side of the ball now through four years, and we’re going to need to do that again.”
Sarkisian will be looking toward returning players to dominate on the defensive side of the ball, specifically with junior linebacker Anthony Hill Jr. and graduate defensive back Michael Taaffe as this year’s captains.
Hill is one of the most significant contributors to that dominance. During the 2024-25 season, Hill started in all 16 games and earned a spot as an All-American second team member, racking up 113 total tackles over the year.
“Our linebacking room, what we’ve tried to do in that room … we tried to make it a really versatile room,” Sarkisian said. “We know about the versatility of Anthony Hill, his ability to play off the ball and on the edge.”
Taaffe’s ability to read an offense has earned him a spot on the second-team All-American list and cemented him as a leader on the field.
“It’s huge for us that (Taaffe) decided to come back for his senior season, his leadership, his ability to communicate the back end for us,” Sarkisian said. “I mean, he is like a coach on the field.”
Joining Taaffe in the secondary this year is freshman Jonah Williams. Taaffe said Williams is going to be “a stud,” with his physical abilities, but also highlighted Williams’ mental strengths, which Taaffe observed while mentoring him on and off the field.
“I was in there with him, trying to help him, and I was like dude, I’ll go down to the downside safety and you can just be in the top and show your range,” Taaffe said. “He was like ‘No, I want to learn both right now,’ and so, it was really cool to see how he’s learning.”
As the Longhorns look ahead to finally reaching their first national championship game since 2009, Sarkisian has been busy putting together a superteam of his own that is able to compete with Texas’s challengers.
