Former Texas Longhorns OT Calls Out 'Ego' of Steve Sarkisian's Play-Calling

It's no secret how inconsistent that the Texas Longhorns offense has been through the first half of the 2025 season, one week they're upsetting a Top 10-ranked team, and the next they're barely squeezing out wins over one of the conference's more underperforming schools.

Amidst the chaos on the offense, the defense has held their ground and have been the reason for the Burnt Orange's success thus far in the season.

And now, one former Texas Longhorns alumnus is providing some words of wisdom in an attempt to help the offense get back on track.

Tony Hills Gets Fired Up Talking About the Texas Offense

Aug 9, 2012; Chicago, IL, USA; Denver Broncos guard Tony Hills (76) in action against the Chicago Bears at Soldier Field. Mandatory Credit: Matthew Emmons-Imagn Images | Matthew Emmons-Imagn Images

As a guest with OnTexasFootball, former Texas offensive lineman and national champion Tony Hills used his experience as a lineman to try and offer some help to get the Longhorns offense back into national championship mode and even issued somewhat of a wake-up call to current head coach Steve Sarkisian, who is the current play caller on the offense for the Horns.

"Whatever the thing you have to do to win, in the sense of what puts your team in a position to win, that is your job as a coach," Hills said. "The reason that people are calling for him to not be the offensive coordinator is because it's seemingly that you're not able to identify that, as an offensive coordinator, the type of offense that you have to run. You have to run this; you cannot run anything else."

Former #Texas OL Tony Hills is fired up and has a lot to say about the current state of the #Longhorns offense and what he believes they should do. 🔥

You’re going to want to hear this. #HookEm pic.twitter.com/bwtVBU1Sxj
— OnTexasFootball (@ontexasfootball) October 23, 2025

Hills would also talk about the defense and everything that they have done to help the offense, seemingly because of the questionable decision-making on Sarkisian's end as the offensive play caller.

"4th and 1 goal line stands, multiple sacks, they're getting interceptions, they're giving you everything and you're giving them nothing because of your ego," Hills said. "It's frustrating, and this is my problem with quote-on-quote 'offensive gurus.'"

The former national champion even brought up a recent game where the offensive scheme was worked to perfection and allowed both sides of the ball to coexist and secure a dominating win.

"This is what you gotta do: do the thing that makes sense," Hills said. "Put 1,500 pounds on the defensive line for four quarters and then let me evaluate your offense. I already saw it done. Everything that I was saying prior to Oklahoma, 'this team is this, this is what they do, here is where their success is going to come from,' they did it one time, took the entire third quarter, put up 10 points, gave us a 20-plus point lead, took all of the clock away, and our defense went nuts."

Hills is, of course, referring to the recent Red River Rivalry game against the Sooners, where the Texas offensive line did their job exceptionally well in the second half, allowing Arch Manning and the rest of the offense to chew up the clock and add points to their 23-6 win over their rivals.

The Longhorns will look to recreate that same kind of fusion when they head to Starkville to take on the Mississippi State Bulldogs in the final stretch of a four-game road schedule.