Here’s how Texas football plans to spend the off week getting ready for Red River rival Oklahoma

How important is the Texas off week? Look at it this way: if the Longhorns go all the way to the national championship game, the season will take up almost half a year.

Crazy, but it’s true. Texas started training camp on July 31, and if they make it to the Jan. 20 finale, the season will have lasted 173 days — or about 47% of a common year.

A whole lot can happen in 24 weeks and five days. That’s why Texas coach Steve Sarkisian is going lighter this week to give the second-ranked Longhorns (5-0, 1-0 SEC) a chance to pause and refresh for October.

“I'm as concerned as anybody, for the duration of this season, Sarkisian said. “The fact that we started a week earlier for training camp, the fact that we played our first game in August, and we’re hoping to play January 20. That’s a long haul for a student-athlete who’s going to school, who’s 18-19, years old, and the toll that it can take.

“I think we need to keep it fresh for them, because I do think the mental intensity we have to have week in and week out is going to be really important.”

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The Longhorns normally practice inside Royal-Memorial Stadium on Mondays. This week, the players had positional meetings and lifted on Monday.

Sarkisian said the players will have a normal Monday-style practice on Tuesday where they get a first look at Oklahoma’s tendencies. The team will go hard on Tuesday and Wednesday and ease up on Thursday.

“We’ll get the meat and potatoes of the game plan in this week,” Sarkisian said. “And then the guys will have a lift Friday morning, and then they’ll be off. We won’t practice Friday, Saturday or Sunday.

“I want them to go be with their families,” he added. “I want them to kind of get refreshed mentally, physically, emotionally, and then we’ll come back. We’ll come back Monday, and we’ll get back to it and have a normal work week to get ready for the ball game.”

Oklahoma (4-1, 1-0) is also off this week, so the Sooners will get some rest, too.

The Horns actually have two bye weeks planted in the schedule. Texas will be off Nov. 2 between the Vanderbilt and Florida games.