Steve Sarkisian coaching career: How he ended up at Texas
Steve Sarkisian’s coaching career hasn’t always gone as planned but the Texas Longhorns found his way eventually after an odyssey of sorts.
Steve Sarkisian is an example of the power of second chances.
The Texas Longhorns head coach put his career in the gutter just a few years ago, but he climbed out of the muck and ended up in Austin.
How did he get where he is now?
Steve Sarkisian coaching career timeline
- USC quarterbacks coach (2001-2003)
- Raiders quarterbacks coach (2004)
- USC quarterbacks coach (2007-2009)
- USC offensive coordinator (2007-2008)
- Washington head coach (2008-2013)
- USC head coach (2013-2015)
- Alabama analyst (2016)
- Falcons offensive coordinator (2017-2018)
- Alabama offensive coordinator (2019-2020)
- Texas head coach (2021-present)
Sarkisian got his first major college football gig as USC’s quarterbacks coach under Pete Carroll. He spent a season with the Raiders but eventually came back to the Trojans to take over the reins of the offense from Lane Kiffin.
The work he did at USC got him his first head coaching opportunity with lowly Washington. He rebuilt the Huskies from the basement of the Pac-12 to a team consistently posting a winning record, though he struggled to turn the corner.
When USC fired Kiffin in 2013, athletic director Pat Haden targeted Sarkisian as his replacement. While things looked promising for the head coach in 2014, everything fell apart when his alcoholism turned destructive. After multiple incidents involving alcohol, the Trojans fired Sarkisian for cause.
Alabama head coach Nick Saban gave Sarkisian a chance to rehabilitate his image as an analyst and he parlayed that experience into the offensive coordinator job in Atlanta. The Falcons eventually made a coaching change at the top so Sarkisian followed an old pattern by replacing Kiffin as the Crimson Tide’s OC. Exceptional work in that role landed him the Texas job.
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