AUSTIN — For the second week in a row, Steve Sarkisian’s Texas football staff has taken a hit as the Detroit Lions lured away the highly respected running backs coach Tashard Choice on Thursday.

The news that one of the Longhorns’ top recruiters is leaving comes on the heels of safeties coach Blake Gideon’s departure to become the defensive coordinator at Georgia Tech.

Texas did replace Gideon on Thursday when it hired Mark Orphey of Rutgers.

Choice will be reunited with Lions new defensive coordinator Kelvin Sheppard, one of his best friends since they played in the NFL together with the Buffalo Bills, as well as running Jahmyr Gibbs, whom Choice coached at Georgia Tech.

The Longhorns also had some good news in that 14 football players have been invited to the NFL combine with the likelihood that Texas could have even more drafted this April than the 11 who were taken in 2025.

Choice, 40, becomes the sixth Longhorn assistant to be plucked off Sarkisian’s coaching staff in the past four seasons. He replaced Stan Drayton, who took a head coaching job at Temple before being fired last November and is currently not employed but in discussions to go to Penn State as its new running backs coach.

All the coaches who left were promoted in their new positions, and three became head coaches.

Under Choice, who joined Texas in December 2021, the Longhorns have had a 1,000-yard rusher every season with Bijan Robinson, Jonathon Brooks and sophomore Quintrevion Wisner, who began the year as third-string but usurped the role with hard running after starting tailback CJ Baxter went down with a knee injury in August.

Choice, who had also been courted by the Dallas Cowboys this offseason, will be an especially critical setback because he had been instrumental in recruiting three top 10 commitments for the 2026 recruiting class. That includes Ezavier “EJ” Crowell, a four-star recruit from Jackson, Ala., who is ranked the No. 8 running back in that class. Crowell told Rivals that he was “shocked” to hear Choice was leaving and announced he is reopening his recruitment. He’s being heavily sought by Alabama and Auburn.

“We had a great relationship,” Crowell told Rivals. “I’ve got to find another official visit.”

He said he was canceling his planned June 6 visit to Austin. Texas is still in the running for Carthage running back KJ Edwards as well as Forney’s Javian Osborne.

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