Texas is looking at redemption when they host Ohio State this year. Last season, Ryan Day’s team punctured the preseason hype of Steve Sarkisian’s Longhorns in Week 1. While Texas has made considerable additions through the portal, Ohio State enters the 2026 season having lost considerable production to the NFL. Even then, former Ohio State head coach Jim Tressel thinks the 2026 roster is an impressive bunch.
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“Ohio State’s a good-looking group,” former Ohio State head coach Jim Tressel said to Mack Brown on August 19 on The Stampede: A Podcast on the Texas Longhorns when asked what Texas fans could expect from the Buckeyes next month. “Now, I haven’t been to practice as much with this new gig I have as I used to… I’ve only been to, I think, one spring practice and one fall practice here in ’26. But it seems like every time I walk in the building, the players look more impressive. I mean, he’s [Ryan Day] got a good-looking group of kids. And I tell you, the other thing that’s very impressive to me is he’s got really good kids.”
“I mean, they’re really good, solid kids. And I think that’s one of the benefits of the fact that now they’re getting a little bit of the compensation because Mack will tell you most of the problems stemmed from the time when the guys just didn’t have anything, and they were generating all that money, and they just didn’t seem to think that was fair.”
The Texas Longhorns face the Buckeyes in a Week 2 matchup on September 12. For hardcore college football fans, the fixture is more than a game. Regardless, Tressel believes the Buckeyes have an edge over the Longhorns. Despite losing the highest number of players to the 2026 NFL Draft in college football, Ohio State’s roster features a lot of student-athletes with star power.
Tressel specifically mentions Jeremiah Smith, describing him as a ‘special’ player. The wide receiver has been tipped by the folks at Cleveland.com to win the Offensive Player of the Year Award. Another outstanding player is quarterback Julian Sayin, who is also rated as one of the best quarterbacks in college football. The team is also stacked with the likes of Caden Curry, Austin Siereveld, Payton Pierce, Luke Montgomery, Kenyatta Jackson Jr., and others.
The Longhorns are not without star power either. Quarterback Arch Manning has been projected by many analysts to win the Heisman Trophy and get drafted as the No. 1 overall pick. And despite being a Buckeye, Tressel admitted Manning’s improvement from the talented but indecisive quarterback he was in the first half of 2025 to the more decisive signal-caller he became.
The matchup also carries significant importance for Steve Sarkisian. The Texas head coach can’t afford to start another season on a wrong footing, especially after how the 2025 campaign transpired. Given the Longhorns’ SEC schedule, a non-conference loss could again prove fatal to their chances of making the playoffs.