When the No. 17 Texas Longhorns host the Arkansas Razorbacks on Saturday at Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium, it will mark just the second home game for head coach Steve Sarkisian’s program in 63
days.
It’s been a challenging stretch from a travel standpoint, regularly forcing the Longhorns into hostile environments like The Swamp and Sanford Stadium, but it’s also been challenging from a recruiting perspective, heightening the importance of the weekend with Early Signing Day looming in less than two weeks.
“I’m not trying to complain, but we didn’t have a home game since Sept. 20, and then our first game back in DKR was an 11 a.m. kickoff the day after Halloween, so it’s very difficult for high school kids, especially if they’re not within about a three-hour radius to drive down,” Sarkisian said. “A lot of those kids, they play Friday night, they’ve got practice and walkthrough and meetings on Saturday mornings, so we didn’t get a great hand dealt to us with our schedule from a recruiting standpoint.”
The final regular-season home game against No. 3 Texas A&M, isn’t much better from a timing standpoint coming on a Friday after Thanksgiving.
“That’s not the ideal time to have a bunch of visitors in because a lot of the kids we’re recruiting are still in the playoffs, so they don’t get to come to games on Friday night,” Sarkisian said.
“We’ve got to do a great job maximizing this weekend and then do the best we can with next Friday night.”
With a class currently ranked No. 9 nationally, Texas is trying to finish strong with several flip candidates scheduled to take official visits this weekend — Minnesota running back commit Jett Walker, LSU offensive tackle commit Brysten Martinez, Stanford interior offensive line commit Kaden Scherer, and UCLA athlete commit Toray Davis, along with former Oklahoma State cornerback commit Josiah Vilmael. The Longhorns could also host another Tigers pledge, consensus five-star defensive tackle Richard Anderson.
“Historically, we’ve done pretty well with that,” Sarkisian said of closing strong in recruiting.
In the past, Texas has taken advantage of coaching chances to secure late flips of top prospects — Kelvin Banks Jr. and Cam Williams both flipped from Oregon late in the 2022 cycle when head coach Mario Cristobal left for Miami. Martinez and Anderson both fit into that category in the wake of Brian Kelly’s termination in Baton Rouge, and few programs are more rudderless than UCLA after Deshaun Foster’s 5-10 tenure in Westwood.
In the 2026 class, the Horns are also trying to poach players from less successful programs, including the attempts to take advantage of proximity with Walker and Scherer, both Austin-area products who play at Georgetown.
Walker and Scherer profile as the most likely flip candidates, but because both are developmental three-star prospects, the ability of the Texas recruiting class to move up in the rankings will be dependent on securing a big flip like Martinez, which would in turn address a need position.
Since the early signing period occurs before the lone transfer portal window in January, a major shift in college football recruiting calendar, the Longhorns staff will have the luxury of assessing portal needs with the clarity provided by the 2026 class inking in early December.
So the evaluation process of available players hasn’t started in earnest yet — at least not to the extent that Sarkisian is willing to admit it publicly — as focus remains on high school prospects in the current recruiting cycle.
