The Texas offense isn't broken, but right now, the Longhorns are bad

The Texas offense is bad.

I won’t declare it broken. I believe it can be repaired and that the Longhorns can put a product on the field capable of helping them win games in the SEC.

But Steve Sarkisian’s offense regressed from a middle-of-the-road performance against San Jose State to a clunker in Saturday’s 27-10 win over UTEP.

After three games, Texas is 12-for-42 on third down, 5-for-12 on fourth down and 8-for-13 in the red zone with six touchdowns, two field goals, two interceptions and three turnovers on downs.

The Miners outperformed the Longhorns on first down (5.3 yards per play for UTEP to 4.5 for Texas), committed fewer penalties (six penalties for 34 yards for the Miners, while the Longhorns were docked 81 yards on seven penalties), got a more efficient day throwing the football from Malachi Nelson (24-for-36, 209 yards and two interceptions) than the one Texas got from Arch Manning (11-for-25, 114 yards, one touchdown and one interception) and averaged more yards per play (4.4 to 4.2 for the Longhorns).

Scotty Walden and his staff deserve a lot of credit for showing up ready to play. UTEP wasn’t intimidated by Texas, came to town with a sound game plan and made the Longhorns work for 60 minutes.

The 4.2 yards per play by the Texas offense marked the fifth-worst single-game output under Sarkisian. The only games in which the Longhorns have been worse under Sarkisian were losses to Arkansas (4.0 yards per play) and Iowa State (3.2) in 2021, TCU (3.3) in 2022 and last season's regular-season meeting with Georgia (3.4).

The issues on offense exist beyond failing to play to a standard or the personnel Texas didn’t have (Quintrevion Wisner, DeAndre Moore Jr. and Emmett Mosley V were out and C.J. Baxter Jr.’s day was done after one carry). Sarkisian’s attack lacks an identity and whether it was Manning’s erratic afternoon (10 consecutive incompletions at one point), the times the offensive line lost the battle at the point of attack (the Miners didn’t record a sack, but they had five tackles for loss and 12 of the Longhorns’ 56 official rushing attempts either lost yards or went for no gain) or poor situational execution, the Texas offense found different ways to stumble throughout the day.

The week leading up to the Sam Houston game next Saturday (7 p.m., SEC Network+) will be a time when Sarkisian must look in the mirror and determine a course of action on offense.

The offense Sarkisian wants (and the one a lot of other people, myself included) isn’t one the Longhorns can have right now. With one non-conference game left, Sarkisian must take the information he’s gathered so far and try to build confidence across the board by building on what the offense can do well.

It might mean that Manning runs the ball more than what Sarkisian initially expected (he ran for two touchdowns, and he and Matthew Caldwell had the longest runs from scrimmage on Saturday, both recording 14-yard gains).

It could mean figuring out which portions of the short passing game can get Manning in a rhythm early in the game so that the defense doesn’t automatically play coverage to prevent the deep ball, rendering the passing game helpless, which is what it was for almost the entirety of the UTEP game.

Sarkisian and Kyle Flood could examine personnel along the offensive line and try a different combination.

Whatever answers Sarkisian comes up with, Texas can’t have a repeat performance of Saturday’s debacle the rest of the way. Even though the defense held up their end of the bargain (six tackles for loss, sacks by Hero Kanu and Zina Umeozulu and interceptions by Jelani McDonald and Graceson Littleton while holding the Miners to a 4-for-13 performance on third down and an 0-for-3 effort on fourth down) and the kicking game is showing signs of growth (Jack Bouwmeester got back on track with a 47.8-yard net punting average, Mason Shipley went 2-for-2 on field goals and Ryan Niblett had a 49-yard punt return), the offense is operating at a level so far below a championship standard that it’s hard to look beyond the next game on the schedule when envisioning the trajectory on that side of the ball.