Two weeks out from the NFL draft and there are 19 Texas Longhorns who have declared for the draft and are eagerly awaiting to see what kind of opportunity they’ll get to play in the league.
That’s 19 players who have represented the Texas Longhorns at a high level. Nineteen players who have gone to at least one College Football Playoff – most of them have gone to the CFP in back-to-back years.
Combine those 19 with the 11 Longhorns who were snatched up in last year's draft and it’s clear that the squad that will take the field in Columbus, Ohio on August 31st will be much younger and much less experienced.
“We're a far, far, far ways away from a finished product right now,” Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian said Tuesday.
The expectations are that the loss of talent won’t matter. Texas has Steve Sarkisian and Arch Manning and that’s enough for most.
Even as Sark was telling the press that, Las Vegas had his Longhorn team as either the favorite, or second best favorite to win it all – depending on which sportsbook you were looking at.
But most teams can’t lose as many players as UT has lost without having some big holes to fill with some inexperienced talent.
“Clearly, some young players are going to have to play for us this fall, and it managing expectations of who those might be,” said Sarkisian. “So there's a lot we're evaluating on a lot of players, but you know, this is the most young players we've ever had at one time in spring practice. So it's been a little bit different for us.”
