The Texas Longhorns are expected to be among the contenders to win the 2025 College Football Playoff, but their head coach is realistic about expectations.

Though Steve Sarkisian is hell-bent on taking Texas to the top, he believes the days of unbeaten national champions are over.

“I don't think we'll see an undefeated champion,” he said Tuesday at the SEC Spring Meetings. “It's so difficult to stay healthy for so long. This idea that someone is going to go 16-0 in college football? If so, put a statue up.”

What Sarkisian is seeing, however, is a feature, not a bug of the current college football format. He admitted himself that he has been in the game a long time, and he recalled being on staff at USC in 2003 when the Trojans shared a national championship with LSU.

“Then we grew into a two-team playoff, and we grew into a four-team playoff and now we’ve grown into where we’re at today,” he continued. “I think at the end of the day we all just want the best teams to have an opportunity to compete for a championship. The length of the season, last year, we played 16 games and that was just to get to the semifinals. It would have been 17 to win a championship.”

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Texas football's Steve Sarkisian is confident in Arch Manning

Texas Longhorns quarterback Arch Manning (16) runs against Ohio State Buckeyes cornerback Jordan Hancock (7) and safety Caleb Downs (2) during the second quarter of the College Football Playoff semifinal in the Cotton Bowl at AT&T Stadium.
Tim Heitman-Imagn Images

When Texas takes the field in the fall, Arch Manning will step in as the starting quarterback after he backed up starter Quinn Ewers last year. Sarkisian is well aware of the spotlight on him, not just as the starting QB at one of the biggest football programs in the country, but as a celebrity of the sport in the NIL era.

“Arch is a great player, but I hope for everybody here that we don’t get too far ahead of ourselves,” Sarkisian said. “Let’s let this guy go play this year. Let’s let him have fun in finally getting his opportunity as the starting quarterback for the Texas Longhorns. It’s been a lifelong dream for this guy to do this.”

ESPN has Texas ranked third in its way-too-early top 25 despite Manning losing four starting offensive linemen and Ewers' three favorite pass targets last year. There's a level of pressure on Manning going into next year, but as Sarkisian said, he's not looking for perfection. He's playing the long game.