There’s no doubt that Mack Brown and his Longhorns have experienced pressure so far during this 2-2 season, but recently even more has been added onto that pile.

Last Sunday, former Texas running back and Longhorns legend Earl Campbell broke his silence and offered his take on the Texas football program, telling Fox 26 in Houston Brown should no longer be the Longhorns head football coach. 

“Nobody likes to get fired or leave a job, but things happen,” Campbell said. “I’d go on record and say yes, I think it’s time.”

The Pro Football Hall of Famer and 1977 Heisman Trophy winner wasn’t the only one to come out against his alma mater. Former Texas quarterback Chris Simms spoke out to say Brown will not be back next season and the Longhorns don’t have enough talent to save the rest of this season.

“Earl has been great for this university,” Brown said. “He will always be welcome here.  He’s one of, if not our best, player ever. I was disappointed in the comments, but he’s entitled to say what he thinks.”

While Brown didn’t hesitate to respond to Campbell’s comments, he didn’t have much to say about Simms’ thoughts on the program.

“I haven’t talked to Chris since the national championship game, so it’s been forever,” Brown said. “I’m not listening to a lot of stuff out there. I’m worrying about Iowa State.”

Brown has been compared to Lane Kiffin, who was fired as USC’s head coach Sunday, adding fuel to the fire in Austin. 

“I’d just say this, I take my hat off for USC for what they’ve done,” Campbell said. “They didn’t mess around with it. They just said, ‘Let’s do it now.’ I think at some point our university’s people are going to have make a decision.”

However, the Longhorns have learned to ignore all of this outside influence and talk.

“That’s USC’s business,” senior Jackson Jeffcoat said. “We’re still going. We’re still good. We have Iowa State this week. We’re just focused on them.”

Texas is only worried about Texas, despite comparisons to the decline at USC.

“We’re here to play football,” senior Carrington Byndom said. “All that other stuff will decide itself out. But for us, it’s just taking it week by week and making sure we are doing our job on the field.”

Instead of worrying about coaching changes, the Longhorns are doing what they can to make sure Brown doesn’t go through the experience that Kiffin has gone through this past week.

“We know that our performance Week 2 had some effect on coaching changes but for us we don’t want anything like that to happen again,” Byndom said. “For us it can be motivation for us to play that much harder.”