Texas football head coach Steve Sarkisian has publicly apologized to ESPN reporter Holly Rowe after cutting last week’s postgame interview short after the Longhorns beat Ohio State.
Sarkisian said the following to start his press conference ahead of Texas’ Week 3 matchup vs. UTSA:
“I want to address is a couple of my in-game interviews last Saturday night at Ohio State ball game. The first at halftime, I was scheduled to have an interview with Laura Rutledge. ESPN was having technical difficulties, and I had to make a had to make an in-moment decision to say wait on the interview or try to get with our team and try to make the proper adjustments to come out and play as good as we could in the second half. I let Laura know that, and I think she said that on air. And then I had an opportunity to visit with Laura when we came back out of the locker room to let her know where our thoughts were as a team and what we needed to do in the second half of that game. As it pertains to after the ball game, again there was a delay after I greeted (Ohio State) Coach (Ryan) Day in the middle of the field. There was a delay in the moment, you know, through that delay, I wanted to go celebrate with our team. We just had a 21-point fourth-quarter comeback against the No. 1 team in the country. If hindsight’s 20/20, if I could do it all over again, I would have exuded more patience in that moment and sat through and waited for the interview with Holly.”
Sarkisian continued…
“Obviously, we have a ton of respect for ESPN and Holly. Holly and I go way back to even to my days of playing at BYU, and we’ve got a great relationship. ESPN is a great partner of ours. We know we’re going to have more opportunities with that crew covering us, and we’re looking forward to those opportunities. So, could have definitely handled that situation better with a little bit more patience in the moment.
That obviously led to the situation. situation with Arch (Manning) and his press conference as it pertained to the AI video, and obviously Arch recognizes he made a mistake, and it’s an unfortunate one. Nowhere do we condone domestic violence or violence against women. Nothing in our program says that nor Arch individually. I think if he could take it back, he would. But he has since apologized to Holly. He’s made a public apology, and you know our goal is that we can move forward and him be the guy that that we all know that he is and what he represents. So those are the two house cleaning things I wanted to make sure I address with with all of you on this call, and then get into the football side of things.”
As Sarkisian pointed out, Arch Manning apologized to Rowe earlier this week for laughing and making light of an AI video that showed Sarkisian slapping Rowe on the field following the game.
Ethan Stone is a Saturday Down South News Editor and an advocate for the return of the Seattle Supersonics.
