Steve Sarkisian Lands on Dodd Trophy Watch List

In Houston, where University of Texas football always draws plenty of attention from alumni and weekend viewers across places like Katy and Sugar Land, Steve Sarkisian picked up another preseason honor this week. The Texas head coach was named to the Dodd Trophy preseason watch list, a national recognition that shines a light on coaching performance, leadership, and program standards.

The honor adds to the steady drumbeat around Texas as the Longhorns head toward the 2025 season. Sarkisian has pushed the program back into the national conversation, and this latest mention reinforces that his work is earning notice well beyond Austin.

Steve Sarkisian adds another preseason honor

The Dodd Trophy is awarded annually to a head coach who combines success on the field with scholarship, leadership, and integrity. Sarkisian making the preseason watch list means Texas enters the year with its coach among the names already under national review for one of college football’s long-running coaching awards.

Preseason watch lists do not decide a winner in July, but they do show which programs are carrying heavyweight expectations into kickoff. Texas has lived in that space for a while now under Sarkisian, especially after the Longhorns reestablished themselves as a Playoff-level contender.

Why the Dodd Trophy watch list matters for Texas

The Dodd Trophy is not built around wins alone. The award also weighs how a coach leads a program off the field, which gives this recognition a little more depth than a standard preseason ranking. For Sarkisian, that matters because Texas has been judged on both its results and the structure he has built inside the program.

That broader standard fits the image Texas wants to carry into another high-pressure season. Expectations are never low in Austin, and they are not low in Houston either, where Longhorn support stretches from sports bars near Washington Avenue to alumni gatherings across the metro.

Texas will have plenty of bigger checkpoints once the season starts, and Sarkisian’s place on the Dodd Trophy watch list will only matter if the Longhorns back it up on Saturdays. For now, this is one more preseason marker that Texas remains one of the sport’s centerpiece programs heading into 2025.

This article is a summary of reporting by University of Texas Athletics. Read the full story here.