Texas fans have to re-familiarize themselves with DC they haven't seen since Mack Brown

Well, in a turn that nobody saw coming, the Texas Longhorns parted ways with defensive coordinator Pete Kwiatkowski and defensive passing game coordinator Duane Akina.

Just like that, one of the most dominant defenses in the country was without the assistant coaches that helped shape it, and the replacement, whom Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian chose, was the last name that any Longhorn fan expected to see: Will Muschamp.

Muschamp was the Horns' defensive coordinator and linebackers coach from 2008 until 2010, under then-head coach Mack Brown and during Texas's run to the 2009 National Championship, where the team lost to Nick Saban and the Alabama Crimson Tide.

Steve Sarkisian has Texas pulling an Obi-Wan Kenobi

"Now, that's a name I've not heard in a long time," is most likely what every Texas Longhorn fan in the world said when they saw the news of Muschamp returning to Austin (yes, that's a quote from Star Wars).

When the Horns parted ways with Brown in 2013, he had long, long ago parted ways from Muschamp, with his former coordinator taking a job as the Florida Gators' head coach (which lasted for less than four years).

Muschamp isn't exactly a beloved name in Austin, even though he helped lead the defensive unit for a team that stood atop the nation at one point. At the end of the day, he still left the team for a job at Florida, a program that the Longhorns don't exactly love either.

After his time with the Gators, Muschamp spent a year as Auburn's defensive coordinator before becoming the head coach of the South Carolina Gamecocks in 2016. Five years later, he was named the Georgia Bulldogs' special teams coach and held a few roles at UGA until earlier this year.

Sarkisian has the Horns going back in time, which isn't necessarily what the program needs after Texas appeared in back-to-back College Football Playoffs and finished the 2025 regular season at 9-3 overall.

However, Muschamp is one of the more qualified candidates to lead the Texas defense and could possibly push the Horns the extra inch that Kwiatkowski wasn't able to.

Clearly, after falling short of a third consecutive berth to the playoffs, Sarkisian wasn't entirely satisfied with his staff and wasted almost no time making changes to the coordinators and assistants who work below him.

The departures of Kwiatkowski and Akina are the fourth and fifth departures of the postseason, joining running backs coach Chad Scott, Director of Scouting Errin Joe, and analyst Tyler Allen, who all took jobs at other programs earlier in the month.