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horn_of_the_morning

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  1. The Other SEC Team in the College Football Playoff: Texas

    The Longhorns won’t officially become members of the Southeastern Conference until July, but they already look like one of the powerhouse teams from college football’s mightiest league
     

    https://www.wsj.com/sports/football/texas-longhorns-college-football-playoff-a5dab99c?mod=hp_featst_pos3

    Spoiler

    Not long after Steve Sarkisian was appointed head football coach of the University of Texas, he closed his office door, sat down at his new desk and pulled out a blank sheet of paper.

    Sarkisian arrived early in 2021 to turn the Longhorns into a national championship contender following a fallow period that produced just a single double-digit win season in 11 years. As he contemplated the challenge ahead of him, Sarkisian began jotting down a list of the programs he wanted his Texas team to emulate.

    Before long, he noticed a pattern. The most successful teams of the past decade were physical in the trenches. They had elite speed at the skill positions. And they hoarded five-star recruits like they were barrels of Texas crude.

    But it was something else they had in common that caught Sarkisian’s attention.

    “Ultimately, a majority of those teams came from the SEC,” Sarkisian said before the season. “So, all right. How do we beat those teams? How do we build a roster to beat those teams?”

    The answer was to build a team that behaves, operates and now plays exactly like a team from the Southeastern Conference, even as Texas technically remains a member of the Big 12 for a few months more.

    Ever since the Longhorns officially accepted an invitation to join the mightiest league in college football in 2021, almost every significant move they have made seems like it was inspired by a marathon binge-watch of the SEC Network. First, they followed the same process as six other SEC schools by tabbing one of Nick Saban’s assistants at Alabama to become their new head coach. Then they persuaded the country’s wealthiest collection of boosters to splurge on upgrades to the team facilities. They loaded up on coaches with SEC experience, recruited bigger, bulkier players and stacked their nonconference schedule with SEC opponents. They even brought in a member of the Manning family to play quarterback. 

    im-906162?width=700&height=466

    TUSCALOOSA, ALABAMA — SEPTEMBER 09: David Gbenda #33 of the Texas Longhorns sacks Jalen Milroe #4 of the Alabama Crimson Tide during the second quarter at Bryant-Denny Stadium on September 09, 2023 in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. (Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images) PHOTO: KEVIN C. COX/GETTY IMAGES

    All of which has led to another outcome that will sound awfully familiar to SEC fans: Texas earned a spot in the College Football Playoff semifinals, where it will face Washington in the Sugar Bowl on Monday, with a berth in the national championship game on the line.

    In other words, seven months before the Longhorns officially join the SEC, they have in all practical purposes already transformed into an SEC team.

    “In the analogy of David and Goliath,” Texas athletic director Chris Del Conte said, “we’re never going to be David.”

    Texas is hardly the first team to attempt to follow the SEC’s playbook. But it’s one of the few schools in the country with the kinds of resources and deep-pocketed boosters to emulate that model. With an operating budget of $225 million and revenue in excess of $239 million during the 2021-22 fiscal year, the most recent period for which data is available, Texas is second only to Ohio State among some 360 Division I schools, per NCAA data compiled by USA Today.

    Del Conte understood that only too well when he was hired to be Texas’ athletic director in 2017 after previous stops at Rice and Texas Christian. He was quick to leverage the school’s resources, giving every sport $10 million for facility upgrades. Football got more, as historic Darrell K. Royal Stadium needed a face-lift. 

    “We were just so far behind…it would be like using a 1950 Bunsen burner in 2023,” Del Conte said. 

    The finished product will look more like a blast furnace. The university completed a $200 million renovation of the south end zone in 2021. Construction on a 10,000-foot recruiting lounge next door and a $70 million indoor practice facility are in the works for the offseason.

     
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    An aerial view of Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium on the campus of the University of Texas. PHOTO: IMAGE OF SPORTS/NEWSCOM/ZUMA PRESS

    “If you expect to be the best and you want to be the best, you’ve got to give your coaches and student athletes all the tools necessary to be the best,” Del Conte said.

    Del Conte also worked to schedule the best available competition. Beginning in 2019, Texas filled its nonconference slate with SEC teams—Louisiana State, Arkansas and Alabama. Del Conte also agreed to play home-and-home series with Ohio State in 2025 and 2026 and Michigan in 2024 and 2027.

    But the biggest deal Del Conte struck was with Sarkisian, who he turned to after firing Tom Herman in 2020 following a 7-3 record and despite a buyout of more than $15.4 million.

     

    Sarkisian was fresh off of leading Alabama to a national championship as coordinator of their most prolific offense ever, and his arrival presaged an influx of coaches with SEC experience. Sarkisian installed two former Alabama deputies as coordinators—Jeff Banks on special teams and Kyle Flood on offense—and hired former Alabama and LSU assistant Bo Davis to coach the defensive line. 

    Even the coaches Sarkisian plucked from outside the SEC were influenced by his time at Alabama. Sarkisian witnessed firsthand how Saban relied on recently departed head coaches to serve as analysts and lend experience to his staff. Sarkisian brought on longtime TCU coach Gary Patterson as a special assistant in 2022. This year, he added former Wisconsin boss Paul Chryst.

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    Steve Sarkisian, right, chats with Texas athletic director Chris Del Conte after defeating Alabama. PHOTO: KEVIN C. COX/GETTY IMAGES

    With the facilities and coaches in place, Sarkisian set out to build a team capable of matching up with the behemoths of the SEC. That meant everything needed to be bigger in Texas. “When Steve looked at the construct of our team,” said Del Conte, “he said, ‘You have 18 wide receivers and eight offensive linemen. That makes no sense to me. We’ve got to get bigger.’” 

    Those priorities were clear from Sarkisian’s first recruiting class: In 2022, 15 of the 28 players Texas signed were linemen or edge rushers. Both five-star recruits were offensive tackles, while seven of the 15 four-star prospects played on the line of scrimmage, according to recruiting site 247sports.

    The following cycle, Sarkisian even did what so many SEC teams have done before him: He signed a guy named Manning to play quarterback. Arch Manning, grandson of Archie Manning, nephew of Peyton and Eli, and the most coveted quarterback in the class of 2023, committed to Texas in June 2022. 

    Though Manning has played barely a handful of snaps this year and will serve as the backup quarterback in Monday’s semifinal, It was a major coup for the Longhorns that was years in the making. According to Manning’s high school coach Nelson Stewart, one of the first calls Sarkisian made after taking the Texas job in 2020 was to the teenage quarterback.

    im-906169?width=700&height=466

    Nov 4, 2023; Austin, Texas, USA; Texas Longhorns quarterback Arch Manning (16) enters Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium before a game against the Kansas State Wildcats. Mandatory Credit: Scott Wachter-USA TODAY Sports PHOTO: SCOTT WACHTER/REUTERS

    From Saban, Sarkisian also learned adaptability. After implementing a strength and conditioning program based on speed and agility in 2021 and seeing the team get pushed around on the field, Sarkisian switched gears. The Longhorns would go back to Olympic power lifting—the kind that famously fortified so many Crimson Tide squads. Two years on, opposing coaches say that Texas is noticeably bigger and more physical.

    Everything has come together in 2023. Until this year, Texas hadn’t beaten any of the SEC teams it scheduled. Then the Longhorns marched into Bryant Denny Stadium and handed Saban the first double-digit home loss of his Alabama tenure. The Longhorns hadn’t won a conference title, or been in the national title race this late in the season since 2009, either.

    But Sarkisian’s makeover has wrapped up just in time. Whatever happens in Monday’s semifinal, Texas has already proven it can play like an SEC program. Which is lucky, because by July 2024, it will actually be one.

    Write to Laine Higgins at laine.higgins@wsj.com

     

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  2. If Gerry and Bobby are gone, I would still like to listen to Paul, Ian and Rod B go on about X/Os etc. What is the alternative? The daily 3 hr streams put out by Ketch with Alex Dunlap and Anwar? Fark me!

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  3. The Woman in the Hamas Video Is My Daughter

    There are 17 young females still being held hostage. One of them is my girl, Naama. And time is running out.

    https://www.thefp.com/p/the-woman-in-the-hamas-video-is-my-daughter

    Spoiler


    Naama Levy, 19, was captured on October 7 and last seen in a video released by Hamas. (Photo via X)

    By Ayelet Levy Shachar

    December 8, 2023


    You have seen the video of my daughter Naama Levy. Everyone has. You have seen her dragged by her long brown hair from the back of a Jeep at gunpoint, somewhere in Gaza, her gray sweatpants covered in blood. You may have perhaps noticed that her ankles are cut, that she’s barefoot and limping. She is seriously injured. She is frightened. And I, her mother, am helpless in these moments of horror. 

    On October 7, Naama had been sleeping at Kibbutz Nahal Oz, and was awakened by the chaotic sound of a missile barrage. At 7 a.m., she sent me a WhatsApp message: “We’re in the safe room. I’ve never heard anything like this.” That was the last I heard from her. 

    The next day, I saw the video, but the woman in the footage was so bloodied and disheveled it was hard to tell if it really was her. Naama’s father called and confirmed the terrible news. 

    Before that day, every video our family had taken of Naama was joyful—dancing with friends, laughing with her three siblings, and simply enjoying life. Naama is only 19, but she’ll always be my baby girl. A girl who truly believes in the good of all people. She enjoys athletics and dreams of a career in diplomacy, and her greatest passion is helping those in need. As a girl, she was a member of the “Hands of Peace” delegation, which brings together American, Israeli, and Palestinian youths to promote global social change.

    But now, one video, totally unrepresentative of the life she had led until October 7, is how the world knows her.


    It has been deeply disturbing to see the United Nations and feminist organizations refuse to acknowledge that Hamas raped and committed appalling sexual crimes against women, simply because the victims are Jewish. It took two months for some to finally admit the scale and the brutality of the horror. Meanwhile, Israeli experts are gathering the evidence. Shari, a volunteer worker at the Shura military morgue, told The Washington Post about what she documented: “We saw many women with bloody underwear, with broken bones, broken legs, broken pelvises.”

    The same monsters who committed those crimes are holding my daughter hostage.

    There are seventeen young women still in captivity. They range in age from 18 to 26. I think of what they, and my Naama, could be subjected to at every moment of the day. Each minute is an eternity in hell. 

    On Monday, State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said that one of the reasons Hamas doesn’t want to release the young female hostages “is they don’t want these women to be able to talk about what happened to them during their time in custody.” 

    Everyone knows exactly what he means.

    What would you do if your daughter were being held hostage by violent rapists and murderers for two months? Perhaps the better question is: What wouldn’t you do?

    Over the last week and a half, dozens of hostages were released. The stories they’ve told about captivity are chilling. Emily Hand, a girl of only nine years, told her father she thought she had been held underground by Hamas for a year. Daniel Aloni was held along with her young daughter Emilia and was forced to participate in a hostage video in which she begged for their release. In it, she famously shrieked the word now, in Hebrew achshav. The way Daniel uttered that last word, now, that primal scream, is what lies in the hearts of every hostage, and every hostage family. It is the sound that rings in the depths of my soul every moment of every day.

    In addition to being Naama Levy’s mother, I’m also a primary care doctor and the team physician for Israel’s women’s soccer team. I work with young women, and I understand the medical risks of spending every day in darkness, without enough nutrition or medical care or even basic hygiene. As a mother, I simply worry: Did my daughter’s captors give her a clean change of clothes, or is she still sitting in the same bloody sweatpants she was abducted in?

    There’s a reason why women and children were prioritized first for release: younger women are at greater risk for further trauma. Just as women and girls are more vulnerable to more forms of violence, they are also more vulnerable to suffering from infections and pregnancy from sexual violence. 

    The longer Naama is held in captivity, the more violence she is subjected to, the more likely she will suffer the consequences of lifelong post-traumatic stress. When she is released, I pray that the image of her abduction, and the experience of what that image represents, isn’t how she comes to see the world.

    Meanwhile, time is passing through an hourglass, and the sands are not infinite.

    The seventeen female hostages are not bargaining chips to be debated by diplomats. They are daughters, and one of them is mine. My primal scream should be the scream of mothers everywhere. Bring her home now!


    Ayelet Levy-Shachar is Naama’s mother. She is a primary care physician for families and for the Israeli women’s soccer team. She is a mother of four and lives in Ra’anana. 

     

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