Bunk Moreland

There is no doubt that Sark built something special that was on the verge of being a machine like Ohio State and Georgia. But it’s also extremely clear that Sark got complacent amid all his success, and he took it for granted that it could just keep rolling on auto-pilot. His complacency led to hubris and arrogance, which led him to not self-evaluate, particular on the offensive side of the ball. He implicitly trusts guys like Flood and Banks, and he let them coast, which led to dramatically underperforming on offense and special teams. He thought his roster was set, ignoring the red lights in the offseason and the incredible team youth, and did not adequately address needs in the portal. I also wonder if becoming a dad has affected his drive and obsession that shaped his first 4 years at Texas. That’s not a knock against him—my productivity nosedived when I became a dad. But if so, it really shows how bad he was at delegating control. Regardless of the answer, he’s going to need to do a lot of soul searching and self-evaluation after the season.

Yes, but at this point I don’t think we only lose 2 games. If this o-line doesn’t get any better, we are losing 4 games. We might lose more if the defense is this bad again. To be honest, THAT was the most shocking part of this loss for me. I expected us to struggle against that Florida D—not in a million years would I have expected us to look so terrible stopping the run and explosive pass plays. Finally, WHERE IS THE PASS RUSH???? Most of us thought this team would be the most explosive pass rush defense at Texas this century. They have been completely absent.

I was originally going to pick something like 38-13, but I chickened out and went 9-6. Talk about extreme waves of emotion leading into this game…

Texas 9-6. It’s gonna be wet and sloppy in the swamp.

It would be pretty entertaining if we had Silas Bolden slipping and sliding around in Gainesville.

CJ when people insult Mateer on the board

The closer we get, the more convinced I am of this. Bring it on—it’ll feel that much sweeter when we beat their ass.

I will follow the old saying “beware Gerrys bearing links” and stay away.

Joe Z is injecting this into his veins

The key to beating them is getting pressure on Reed and stopping the run. If he has all day, Reed can hit some big throws. But he turns it over if you can pressure him. Their D was better against Auburn than I expected, but they also got shredded by Notre Dame. I still like our chances, especially in Austin.

That was my first thought too, but I think Quinn might have better BGO than Sorrell.

Also, I keep saying it but we all collectively need to stop judging Arch as a college football player. The time to do that will be the end of 2026, when he’s had two full years as a starter to develop. Trying to evaluate a young player week to week is short-sighted, and yet that is precisely what the national pundits (and many Texas fans) are doing with Arch. What we should be doing is looking for an upward trend. I think we will know a lot more (but not everything) about who Arch is as a player by the end of this season. In the meantime, is he showing us SOMETHING every single week? Is he improving at the little things, like footwork and mechanics and how he responds to adversity? If the answer is yes, then I don’t care if he completes 55% of his passes and throws an INT in any given game—is he getting cumulatively better?

Yeah, I don’t want any sneers from the national pundits about how Texas stomped Florida with their backup QB. They’re already going to say “oh well, Florida is now 1-4, so we don’t really know that much about Texas since they beat a bad team.” Which is completely disingenuous, but we might not get any credibility going forward in any game unless/until we beat Georgia on the road. That’s pretty much our first chance to prove that we are for real (or not).

Hey, the nation can whine about Texas missing all these starting QBs until the cows come home. If it increases our chances of making the CFP, then it doesn’t bother me in the least.