Steve Sarkisian squashes summer beef with Joey McGuire: ‘We’re all good’

The verbal offseason spat between Texas coach Steve Sarkisian and Texas Tech coach Joey McGuire appears to have come to an end. The two are mending fences ahead of the 2026 season. Both coaches appeared at a Texas High School Coaches Association convention on Sunday afternoon. The two took the stage together, along with a handful of other coaches, during an FBS coaches’ roundtable. [ $19.99 gets you a FULL year of On3 | Rivals national coverage ] Steve Sarkisian took the opportunity to clear the air. He opened up: “We are sitting next to each other, y’all,” Sarkisian said with a smile. “We’re all good up here.” McGuire appeared to take well enough to the gesture, as Sarkisian put a friendly arm around the Red Raiders head coach. Then the convention carried on. So what was the beef between the two? It started earlier this spring when Steve Sarkisian appeared to call Texas Tech’s strength of schedule into question. “There’s a team in our state that plays in another conference that has a schedule that I would argue if I played with our twos and our threes, we could go undefeated, and they’ll probably make the CFP this year,” Sarkisian said. The quote quickly went viral. And McGuire took issue. He called Sarkisian “a pretty tough guy,” initially voicing skepticism that the Texas head coach could have been referring to Texas Tech. Then he offered to play Texas, even if it meant buying out other game contracts. “We’ll buy our contract out of Abilene Christian,” McGuire said. “I’m sure because Texas has a lot of money they can buy their contact out. But I do know there’s a lot of Red Raiders that will help them buy that contract out if they don’t want to and they can come to Lubbock in Week 1. We can figure out if their twos and threes can win this conference.” Later, Steve Sarkisian seemed to back down from his comments a touch on The Triple Option podcast. He clarified, well before officially ending the beef on Sunday at the THSCA event. “It wasn’t a slight against Tech,” Sarkisian said on The Triple Option. “I know Tech’s a good football team. I have no umbrage against that. But their non-conference schedule is what it is. They’re not playing two other really good teams in their conference in BYU and Utah, and the whole thing kind of blew up. Then, Joey’s got to defend his team and then, I’ve got to make another joke to kind of calm the waters. “It is what it is. Believe it, I’ve got plenty enough of a tough schedule that I think about anybody in our country has. I don’t need to add another Top 10-ranked team to our schedule right now.”