College Football

Tom Herman's Most Important Hire Will Turn Around Texas Football

Updated Mar. 5, 2020 1:24 a.m. ET

Fansided, James Caldwell/FanSided via Hook'em Headlines

Meet The Other Man Who Will Turn Around Texas Football

New Texas Longhorns football coach Tom Herman finalized his coaching staff this past week. Included was the most important staff hire, Strength & Conditioning coach Yancy McKnight.

McKnight will single-handedly turn around the Longhorns football team. He just did at the University of Houston and has a track record of success at other colleges.

When Houston played the “big boys” of college football over the past two seasons, the Cougars looked like a legitimate Power 5 team. The defense dominated Florida St. and Dalvin Cook in the 2015/16 Peach Bowl, the Offensive Line bullied Oklahoma in the 2016 season opener, and the defense sacked Heisman trophy winner Lamar Jackson 11 times at the end of the 2016 season.

Then-Houston coordinators Todd Orlando and Major Applewhite deserve credit, too. Orlando will certainly look to duplicate his success in Austin as Defensive Coordinator. But, you could tell from watching the Cougars play under Herman that Houston could hang with anyone in the country.

Training Changes Needed

Herman spoke very highly of Coach McKnight in his announcement of the 2017 Texas Football coaching staff. McKnight’s former players at Houston also consider him as important to the Cougars’ success as Herman.

Too often during the 2016 season, the Longhorns offensive and defensive units wore down in the second half. The defense was on the field too much after the Horns offense routinely went three-and-out. And, the O-Line regularly put the offense behind the chains with mental mistakes and penalties.

Coach McKnight will knock the bad habits out of the key units on this Longhorns team. He knows how to train and motivate his players to be at their absolute best for critical moments, like the fourth quarter of the Cougars’ win over Oklahoma.

Tom Herman is at Texas thanks to two amazing seasons in Houston. The man who was instrumental in driving that success is Yancy McKnight, who recently drew the attention of the New York Times.

Yancy McKnight = Tom Herman

Coach McKnight is unique for this role because of what Herman talked about in his December introductory press conference. Alignment.

“What makes Yancy so special is he is 100 percent an extension of me and my voice, and it’s very, very clear that every time he speaks to the team, it’s me talking,” Herman told the New York Times in July 2016.

One of Herman’s big coaching philosophies is the alignment factor. At Houston, Coach Herman drew from Ohio St. head coach Urban Meyer’s emphasis on all aspects of the program being aligned to create success.

Herman knows that when his squad is training, Coach McKnight will prepare the team for success. And that will be the difference between under-performing Longhorns teams of the past and successful squads to follow under Herman.