Kentucky will travel to Austin, Tex., to take on a loaded Texas team during the Longhorns' first year in the Southeastern Conference.

It's one of the toughest games on schedule for the Wildcats, at least on paper, with UT reaching the College Football Playoff and returning Quinn Ewers at quarterback.

Here's what we learned about the Horns from Steve Sarkisian.

** Steve Sarkisian said Texas will have to earn the respect of opposing opponents and fans. That will be at the forefront of what they do. The beauty of the SEC, Sark said, is the pageantry, the fans, the stadiums. It's exciting to be a part of it.

** This Texas team has been very focused. "It's been a long time coming for Texas to get back to this stage. Last year was a tremendous run. We fell short...coming off being Big XII champions." Texas set a school record with 11 draft picks. Sark highlighted the development of Texas players and what the NFL sees in those players.

** "They got a taste" for what it's like being on that highest stage. "Obsession" is a theme that came from the Texas players. "They couldn't wait to get back to work." Sarkisian said it was about prodding cattle early on, making sure they do things right, and now the team is hungry and it's a competitive roster. You have to have depth in the SEC. Sarkisian said you have to have depth everywhere, not only on the lines of scrimmage. Sarkisian said this is the deepest, most talented team the Horns have had since he's been there, even more so than last year.

** Sarkisian emphasized Texas' "coordinator continuity". This is the fourth year in a row they've had the same coordinators.

** Texas really tried to stop the run last year and it showed. They have to improve the pass defense better. You have to have good personnel but you also have to be able to get after the quarterback.

Sarkisian Q&A...

Q. I think we all totally get why Arch would come to Texas and basically face the prospect of perhaps sitting for two years, the support system he's got and everything. But I wonder if you could recount what that conversation was like, that that may be the case, that you're going to get the training, you're going to get enough reps and experience here to get where you want to go?

STEVE SARKISIAN: Well, I think that's something historically for us, part of your recruiting is your track record. We've been fortunate to coach some pretty good quarterbacks. We've been fortunate to do it for some decades now. We've been fortunate to have some really good quarterback rooms, and I think the Manning family is pretty well aware of that.

I think they trained Arch to try to put himself in the best position to try to play in the best conference in America and then ultimately put himself in the best position to further his career playing in the National Football League.

With that, I think Arch's development has been important to the family, and he's reaping the benefit of those things. It hasn't been very difficult at all. I think it's been pretty simple for him.

Q. You haven't used a big rotation in your receivers, it seemed like, and with good reason. You don't want to take Xavier and A.D. off the field. But with so many in the portal, so many young receivers coming in, including Wingo, might you expand your rotation and play more of them, or it just makes it more competitive in practice?

STEVE SARKISIAN: I think it's twofold. We are going to play more receivers. I think the length of the season, and because of not having all of the rapport with Quinn, some of that we'll have to feel out as games go. It is a very talented room for sure, and we've got three great transfers.

When you talk about Isaiah Bond, Matthew Golden, Silas Bolden, three really good experienced football players that came from good football programs. We had signed a very good class the year before with Johntay Cook, DeAndre Moore, and Ryan Niblett. Then with this incoming class, I think it's pretty fair to say Ryan Wingo is a really good player for us.

To think I've got seven quality players there. Now, is it going to be a seven-man rotation? That will bear itself out, but I do think we'll play more players than we have in the past, we'll rotate more guys than we probably have in the past, and then as we work ourselves through the season -- when you start playing this many games, I'd love to tell you we're not going to get injuries. Injuries are going to occur, so we're going to play more players probably early in the season than we have just because you don't have some of that experience that we lost from a year ago.

But this isn't a lack of talent. This group is very talented and by far and away our deepest receiver corps that we've had in four years.

Q. There's a lot of Heisman hype with Quinn and Carson Beck. How does his demeanor make him ideal to deal with all that external noise?

STEVE SARKISIAN: You know, I think Quinn is probably like the coolest guy in the room. He doesn't get caught up in what a Heisman -- if you asked him, would he even know? He's just not caught up in that stuff. When Quinn gets free time, he's going to go hunt or he's going to go fish. When he's here, he's going to work, and he's just working on his craft. He's being with his teammates.

Even in game, when you think about Quinn, when he shows those moments of emotion on a great throw, it's almost like shocking to people because even when the bad moments occur, he stays so calm and so cool in the moment that with the hype, I just don't think we have to worry too much about that. He's more focused on trying to win a championship, playing the best football he can play, being the best leader, the best teammate he can be. That's probably more important to him than what award might be down the road because some people are saying he might win it.

There's so much football to go play, I don't think he's worried about it at all.

Q. Sark, I know you probably would have loved to have hit the ground running and won 12 games in year one, but what changed over those two years, building up to year three? Why was year three so much different? Why did it click?

STEVE SARKISIAN: Well, I think part of it was our culture. We had to keep building our culture, the things that were important to us, and that takes time. It takes time to learn the schemes.

You bring in coaches and you have an idea of what you want to run, and that's nothing against a previous staff, but maybe they didn't recruit the types of players that fit what we wanted to be and how we wanted to play. So that takes time, too.

There's development of players in your program, so hey, I'll tell you this much, 5-7 in Austin, Texas, sucks. That was hard. That was hard on me. That was hard on players. That was hard on a lot of people. 8-5 was a little more palatable for people.

But as you continue to stay committed to who you are and you stay committed to your course of action, you stay committed to what you believe in, over time you start to reap the benefits of that.

With that comes sometimes you have to -- people that were supposed to be good players when you arrived maybe aren't playing as much and maybe the guy that fit you a little bit better, you have to recognize and you have to play him a little bit more.

But everybody earned their opportunity in our program over the past three years, and the beauty of that has been our players recognize that, and then now they know the process to go make it work.

I was telling somebody earlier today about a story about the leaders on our team. When we had Bijan Robinson and Roschon Johnson, everybody raved about their leadership ability, but we only had a couple of leaders.

Last year we raved about the leadership of about five or six guys, Jordan Whittingtons of the world, Byron Murphys of the world. This year I could probably tell you I've got 25 leaders because these guys have grown up in our program. They don't know any different than our culture.

So now I don't even have to speak very long about what we believe in because they live it every single day, and I watch them live it every single day. That's the process, right? You're trying to develop leadership; well, leadership takes time to develop. You just don't anoint a guy a leader if he doesn't believe in the core values of the organization.

Q. Last year you talked a lot about the versatility of the team and helping you win in games. With J.B. gone and the receivers and J.T., what do you see as the next natural evolution for the offense?

STEVE SARKISIAN: Well, I think without telling Coach Norvell at Colorado State what we're going to do in week one, part of it is we always try to stay on the cutting edge. I never want to get stale offensively. I know what I said earlier, we're going to be who we are, but with that comes all of the subtle tweaks and things and formations and motions and personnel groupings and how do you group people the right way to take advantage of it.Part of that is trying to play your best players. Part of that is how do we tax the defense. So we do have a very versatile offensive team. The fact that we've got very versatile runners, we've got versatile tight ends -- the addition of Amari Niblack has been great; Juan Davis, who I've been so impressed with coming out of spring ball and this summer; Gunnar Helm, we found out a lot about him when J.T. went down last year. We use an extra tackle at tight end some. We try to do a lot of things to people to make them prepare for it.

Then in game what are we going to call that game that maybe they didn't practice quite as much or hey, they have a deficiency here, let's go attack that a little bit more. I'm not trying to avoid the question, but sometimes it's we implement an offense and then we tap into different aspects of it from week to week that we think behoove us to be successful.

Q. Coach, you have the unique experience of having coached in the Iron Bowl and the Red River Rivalry. Last month in Destin your athletic director said the Texas-Oklahoma game was a bigger game, a bigger event than the Iron Bowl. What is it about that game that makes it a bigger event than the Iron Bowl or other SEC rivalry games?

STEVE SARKISIAN: Well, I think this, and I've been fortunate. Like I said, I've been part of the Iron Bowl. I've been part of the Apple Cup in Washington. I've been part of SC-UCLA. I've been part of some great games.

This is the most unique game for sure that I've ever been a part of. When you pull into the State Fair and you start smelling those corn dogs and turkey legs and there's fans from both teams and then you get in those locker rooms and the locker rooms literally are 20 feet apart and you're staring at each team, and one goes first, the next one goes next, and it can get a little contentious in there, but that's okay.

As we come out, when we come out of that tunnel -- and that's OU's tunnel -- and we're staring at a sea of burnt orange, you just want to get there. It's a unique game because half of the game is a home game. The other half of the game is a road game. I had to learn that the hard way in year one. We got stuck in OU's end, and we were false starting. We couldn't do anything right. So you have to play to that style of game.

But it being split right down the 50, it's the who's who on the sidelines, and I'll tell you this about both teams. Both teams play as hard as they possibly can play in that game, and again, that's to take nothing away from any other great game that I've been part of, but this one is uniquely special.I think Norman is about 2 1/2 hours from Dallas. We're about 3 hours from Dallas. The fact that we kind of come upon the State Fair here in Dallas is really special. So it's a game that I'm humbled and honored that I get to be part of. I'm getting to go coach in my fourth one. Looking forward to the opportunity.Q. Coach, you mentioned rivalry games, of course. Since you've been here, what have you heard about the Texas-A&M rivalry, and what kind of buzz is there for this game coming back?

STEVE SARKISIAN: Well, it's a great game. It's a game, like I said, that divides households and one that -- it's interesting, our players, I listen to our players talk sometimes, and they're like, our players are probably way more excited for this game than most fans would probably think because we haven't played the game in a while.

But the majority of the players on our two rosters probably went on visits together at if not one school, both schools, and one guy chose Texas and one guy chose A&M.I think there's a great deal of excitement. I know Coach Elko has done a great job in that program in his short time being there. It's going to be a great environment in Kyle Field Thanksgiving weekend, so we're definitely looking forward to it.

Q. Obviously what you guys have done in the last three years, building momentum, building belief, you wanted to do that anyway, but taking that into the SEC, on the list of intangibles, how important do you feel like that is for your program?STEVE SARKISIAN: Well, it's critical. This is an elite conference. It's going to take week in and week out work ethic, preparation, innovation, toughness, perseverance, mental fortitude, if you get knocked down, to get back up. It's going to take all the stuff we went through the last three years and put it in one year because that's what this conference challenges you on. You're playing at an elite level week in and week out.I think that's -- those three years have to roll into this year. That's my challenge as a coach is to get our team in that frame of mind but yet still enjoy the experience. There's nothing like playing college football. It's the greatest sport in the world. I know we're going through all sorts of different changes right now, but the popularity and the excitement around college football right now is bigger and better than it's ever been.Through all that stuff, all that stuff I just talked about, I want to make sure our players enjoy this. You think about it, I talked about three rivalry games in one season. How many schools get to say that? We're looking forward to it. It's going to be a great opportunity, and look forward to seeing you all. If you haven't been to the Red Rivalry game, you should come. It's an amazing game.