ESPN’s Heather Dinich says she’s ‘all in’ on Texas in 2026: ‘This is the year’
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ESPN college football analyst Heather Dinich believes in burnt orange in 2026.
In the aftermath of Monday’s release of the preseason AP Top 25, in which Texas is ranked 5th, Dinich has a big-time feeling that Arch Manning and the Longhorns will be No. 1 when the dust settles in January. Dinich appeared on The Pat McAfee Show on Monday afternoon and threw her support around Steve Sarkisian‘s program, the one with a Manning at the helm and the one that didn’t even make it to the College Football Playoff last season in Manning’s first year as the starting quarterback.
But that was all last year. It’s a new season, and Dinich believes 2026 will ultimately belong to the Texas Longhorns.
“I zero in at No. 5 (in the preseason poll), and I just don’t understand how people can’t get Texas right, right now. Last year, everyone overhyped Texas, it was not the right time, it was Arch Manning’s first year as full-time starter, they had all kinds of questions,” Dinich said. “This year is the year that Steve Sarkisian should win the national title.”
Dinich went deeper, talking about how everything sets up so well for Texas to go the distance this season.
“When you look at Texas, on paper, I don’t know how you can’t think this team is No. 1 or No. 2 in the country, and then you add to that they get (Ohio State) at home, in Week 2, I mean that’s a huge edge in the College Football Playoff race. I’m all in on the Longhorns this year, not last year,” Dinich said.
If Texas is going to do what Dinich says the Longhorns will do, then it’ll be a battle to get through college football’s heavyweights in 2026. Here is what the Kalshi market is currently saying about Texas’s chances to win it all led by the quarterback with the legacy last name:
Cory Nightingale, a former sportswriter and sports editor at the Miami Herald and Palm Beach Post, is a South Florida-based freelance writer who covers Alabama for SaturdayDownSouth.com.
