Priority No. 1 for Texas this spring practice is overhauling the program. Five new on-field assistant coaches will install a new offense and a new defense. They will search for faster, tougher, stronger playmakers, especially young ones, to make those schemes sing. Workouts are closed to the media and public until the April 3 spring game. Everything is new in Austin -- at this rate, they might as well change the uniform colors to purple and yellow.
The changes are designed to make the Longhorns winners again, to make last season’s 5-7 flop a one-year fluke that never gets repeated by a Mack Brown-coached team. To restore program’s confidence. Returning UT players said teams have quit fearing them. Texas, in a way, only wants to be Texas again.
Texas head coach Mack Brown signals to his players during the first quarter of the BCS Championship NCAA college football game against Alabama in Pasadena, Calif., Thursday, Jan. 7, 2010. (AP Photo)
“The big thing here is the juice,” defensive coordinator Manny Diaz said. “This is one of those places where the name can really help you. But the swagger has to come from something tangible.”
As March dawns, each member of the Longhorns program has seen his life rocked by Brown’s moves since November. You want tangible? Try a new strength coach, Bennie Wylie, who participates in running drills with all three UT workout groups and lifts with one of them. And during those sessions, players wore their names on the backs of their shirts, so the new coaches could identify them.
"We just didn’t have enough leaders last year. You couldn’t point to a single guy on offense who was keeping us together."
The tangible continues in the coaches’ office, too. Two of 2010’s assistants retired, and offensive coordinator Greg Davis resigned. Three others left for new jobs, including defensive coordinator and coach-in-waiting Will Muschamp taking over at Florida. (Secondary coach Duane Akina left for Arizona but returned for the same position less than a month later.)
Lead among the new faces is Diaz, who arrives after turning Mississippi State into a Top 25 defense. He hopes to instill an attacking approach in the Texas defensive front, which under Muschamp spent most of its time absorbing blocks and allowing linebackers and defensive backs to make plays.
Former Boise State coordinator Bryan Harsin now leads the offense and will bring the Broncos offense to UT. Expect the usual – dozens of formations, motion on almost every snap, a deep ball on occasion, and just enough sprinkled-in trick plays to scare every Big 12 defensive coordinator. And players say he brings a day-to-day intensity Davis and his staff lacked.
“He’s a younger guy, and he has a lot of energy,” receiver Malcolm Williams said. “You see the energy in his eyes, and it spreads like a fire in the woods.”
Harsin’s mission over these 15 practices is to connect with Garrett Gilbert, whose struggles as a sophomore served as a microcosm for the Longhorns’ lost 2010. He threw more interceptions than touchdowns and saw his confidence shaken, especially in a November loss at Kansas State.
Improving Gilbert’s mindset and play is paramount to a UT revival in 2011, says former NFL personnel man Vinny Cerrato.
“I told Mack, look at what has made Texas so good the last six or seven years,” said Cerrato, who evaluated the Longhorns in November as a paid consultant. “Vince Young and Colt McCoy. They’ve got to get better quarterback play.”
Big picture, Texas has to get better players, too. The Longhorns got outplayed at the line of scrimmage throughout last season. And the offense lacked an intimidating skill player – Cerrato said incoming freshman running back Malcolm Brown will be UT’s best big-play threat.
A dynamic back would follow the trend of everything changing at Texas. Mack Brown is banking part of his legacy on all the changes adding up to one significant change – an increase in victories. With that would come the return of the confidence, the swagger. And Texas, in a way, would be Texas once again.
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