Texas players saw the total chaos unfolding across the SEC over the weekend , and at least one Longhorn thought it looked cool.
“I’m not gonna lie,” linebacker David Gbenda said. “I do kind of want that experience. I want to be on, like, the winning side.”
Winning does seem better than losing. “It wasn't really fun whenever running down, like, some frat dude is yelling at you,” Gbenda said.
Frat dudes love to celebrate upset victories, too. The scene at Vanderbilt and Arkansas last weekend only highlighted that No. 1 Texas (5-0, 1-0 SEC) must take everyone and everything in equal measure if they want to win the SEC.
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Fortunately, this week needs no extra hype. The Red River rivalry has its own built-in hype machine with corn dogs, Big Tex and fans flipping off both teams’ busses as they enter the State Fair of Texas.
Texas coach Steve Sarkisian drills one simple message into his players — “Be enamored with us.” In short, don’t worry about the other team. The Longhorns should focus on themselves.
“Coach Sark, he just keeps us make sure we're dialed in with us and be enamored with us, to always just focus on us and focus on the right things,” defensive back Jahdae Barron said. “You know, it’s going to be these opinions good over here and then bad opinions over here. But just be enamored with us and make it about us and then, ultimately, we’ll be good.”
Defensive end Barryn Sorrell said, “Obviously, every week is going to be a challenge. And, I mean, it doesn't really matter what guys are ranked. I mean, it's going to be a fight every week.”
Gbenda admitted that last Saturday’s craziness was eye-opening. Four teams ranked in the top 11 all lost to unranked foes.
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“It was just more like to reinforce the idea of like, we need to home in on the little details,” Gbenda said. “And regardless, the hay is never in the barn. We’ve got to make sure we have every rock turned, every little thing we need to home in on. We need to make sure we're fanatical to the ball, make sure we just have everything sound because it doesn't matter who you're facing, regardless of what's going to happen.
“It’s college football. Anything can happen.”
This might as well be Mozart to Sarkisian’s ears.
“I love when I hear our players speak,” Sarkisian said. “They’re speaking our language, you know, and it comes out of them very naturally. And so like today, you guys (reporters) will interview all our guys, and the fact of they’re going to talk in a certain way makes me feel good that what we've created here is one that that I'm proud of.”
Said Barron: “Sark’s a very smart dude. I'll be using some of his words — enamored. Hey, I've never really heard the word but that's a good word. So now I use enamored.”
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