Jeff Howe

Learn from it, flush it and move on to Tennessee.

This is a huge concern for me the day after. More often than not, for quarterbacks, discretion is the better part of valor.

Sark isn't without blame, but I'm putting a much greater percentage on last night toward Arch's performance.

There was something to that last night. It felt like Sark's calls were geared toward helping Arch improve in areas where he's struggled in the past. Still, as I've said in other posts, Sark can only do so much when Arch isn't hitting open receivers.

Bobby said it best on Coffee & Football recently: Arch isn't a great quarterback, but he's a good football player.

It's a concern that Arch's performance was bad enough to make you question anything and everything about his development. I agree that he will get better. I'm just disappointed that I thought performances this bad were a thing of the past.

If OU hadn’t stunk it up against Michigan, they’d probably be in Athens.

Peyton has to be the guest picker, right?

That series loss is squarely on @Blake Munroe!

Last night was bad, but I'm not ready to throw the baby out with the bathwater. Sark can only do so much when his quarterback isn't hitting open receivers.

It's officially official. This is the second time in three weeks Texas will be featured on ESPN College GameDay. I'm sure ESPN regrets slotting this game at 11 a.m.

Through the 11:26 mark of the second quarter in Saturday’s 30-6 win over UTSA, No. 1 Texas picked up where it left off in the fourth quarter of last week’s 24-23 comeback win over Ohio State. The Longhorns led 17-3 after Arch Manning’s 3-yard touchdown pass to Cam Coleman capped a seven-play, 57-yard drive. Steve Sarkisian’s offense averaged 5.5 yards per play, with Manning’s 9-for-12, 102-yard effort and two touchdowns balancing a rushing attack that churned out 57 yards on 11 carries. Unfortunately, it was downhill from there. The offense lacked cohesiveness, consistency and flow until Derrek Cooper ended an eight-play, 66-yard drive in the fourth quarter with his first career touchdown (a 1-yard run over the right side of the line). Manning completed seven of his final 20 pass attempts. Texas (3-0) went 4-for-13 on third down the rest of the way and failed to move the chains twice on fourth down (0-for-2). Obviously, if the Longhorns execute at a similarly forgettable level against Tennessee in their SEC opener next Saturday (11 a.m., ABC), it’ll be a different story on the scoreboard. While Saturday’s clunker came in a lopsided win, Monday’s film session will show a lot of meat on the bone against Jeff Traylor’s scrappy Roadrunners. *** Manning wasn’t good on Saturday. There’s no sugarcoating his struggles. He's still unable to hit the crossing routes in Sarkisian’s offense. While the Longhorn receivers either couldn't get open against man coverage or dropped his on-target throws, Manning either misfired or didn’t pull the trigger on plays that could’ve gone for big yardage. For now, it’s fair to put Manning’s performance (16-for-32 for 161 yards and two touchdowns, with 50 yards rushing on nine official attempts) in the column of a bad night. It’s too early in the season (and too soon after his late second-half outing against the Buckeyes) to hit the panic button. Nevertheless, Manning looked more like he did when he struggled throughout the first half of the 2025 season on Saturday, not like the guy who played as well as any quarterback in the country down the stretch. *** UTSA deserves credit for crossing up the Texas offensive line with various blitzes, games and stunts and making the Longhorns play behind the chains. That led to Manning bailing out of the pocket more than anybody wanted him to, which exposed him to too many hits in a game Texas won comfortably. *** Late, hard-charging runs by Cooper (44 yards on 11 carries), Hollywood Smothers (10 carries for 54 yards) and Michael Terry III (seven carries for 39 yards) helped Texas finish with a season-high 228 rushing yards (4.8 yards per attempt). Still, the Longhorns did a solid job running the football; only seven of the 39 carries by the running backs were stopped at or behind the line of scrimmage and seven of the team’s 47 non-sack rushing attempts went for 10 or more yards. *** Sarkisian doesn’t need to call a jump ball in the red zone for the rest of the season unless it’s going to Cam Coleman. *** The most disappointing aspect of the offense’s performance was that they wasted outstanding field position. Five drives that started at their own 43, 45, 48 and 49 and the UTSA 39-yard line resulted in Texas only scoring 13 points. *** Maybe Saturday’s offensive performance will be in 2026 what the Wyoming game was in 2023. After the Longhorns went on the road and handed Nick Saban his largest margin of defeat in Tuscaloosa, Texas was tied with the Cowboys, 10-10, going into the fourth quarter; a 44-yard touchdown pass from Quinn Ewers to Xavier Worthy kickstarted a 21-point surge, leading to a 31-10 victory. Time will tell. Still, if we’re judging this offense against the offseason expectations of it potentially being Sarkisian’s best on the Forty Acres, Saturday’s effort fell woefully short. *** I’ve dissected the offense long enough. The Longhorns’ overall margin for error was significant because Will Muschamp’s defense put the clamps on UTSA (2-1). After the Roadrunners kicked a field goal at the end of a 13-play, 59-yard drive, one on which Will Henderson III had success running off-tackle, Muschamp’s adjustments suffocated Henderson, Owen McCown and the rest of the Roadrunners’ offense. From the 7:05 mark of the first quarter, UTSA had 146 yards of total offense (3.04 yards per play), three first downs and went 0-for-9 on third down. Although the offense looked as unappealing as possible, Texas played championship-caliber defense. *** The game was so tightly officiated (both teams combined for 20 penalties) that I don’t know what to make of the Longhorns finishing the game with eight penalties for 88 yards. It was a sloppy performance, but the SEC officiating crew contributed to the clunky flow. View full news story

Chase Cotton, one of the top right-handed pitchers in the 2028 class, has committed to Texas. Cotton was on campus for the football game against Ohio State. This is one of the commitments @Blake Munroe hinted at earlier today. Massive pickup for Jim Schlossnagle and Max Weiner, to say the least.

Jeff Traylor's team is going to play hard, but this is a good week for Texas to get right before SEC play.

AUSTIN, Texas — Steve Sarkisian couldn’t have been blunter when describing how No. 1 Texas has protected the football and played defense on third down through two games. On Monday, two days after the Longhorns rallied for a 24-23 win over then-No. 1 Ohio State and immediately following his team’s first practice ahead of their non-conference finale against UTSA on Saturday (7 p.m., SEC Network+), Sarkisian mentioned ball security and third-down defense as things Texas (2-0) must fix after the team’s film review of the good, bad and ugly plays from the victory over the Buckeyes. “I got on the offense's butt this morning about the ball. Our ball security is not good enough. Not to be a championship team,” Sarkisian said. “Our third-down defense right now is not good enough. Not to be a championship team.” Only five SEC teams have fumbled the football more than Texas has heading into the Longhorns’ third all-time meeting against Jeff Traylor’s Roadrunners, with three fumbles coming against Ohio State. While heads-up plays by Kade Phillips (to recover a muffed punt by Ryan Niblett late in the third quarter) and Cam Coleman (to recover fumble on the ensuing offensive series by Emmett Mosley V at the end of a 15-yard completion from Arch Manning) helped Texas end the game with Raleek Brown’s fumble on the first play from scrimmage as its only lost fumble, the Longhorns are almost halfway to their 13-game fumble total in 2025 (eight, two of which were lost) and one-third of the way to the nine turnovers they had last season (Brown’s fumble and two interceptions by Manning, one in each game). “We take pride in our ability to take care of the ball,” Sarkisian said. “We've got to improve our ball security because it wasn't just about the turnovers; it was the other fumbles.” With only eight FBS teams forcing more turnovers heading into Week 3 than UTSA (2-0), this would be a good week to right the ship. The Roadrunners have five takeaways this season (tied for fifth nationally with a plus-2.5 turnover margin per game), three of which came in their 31-26 come-from-behind road win over Texas State last week. “We have got to value the football more in the organization than we have through two games,” Sarkisian said. Will Muschamp’s defense getting off the field more frequently on third down, however, requires a more nuanced resolution. The Longhorns are tied for 125th nationally in third-down defense, with Texas State and Ohio State moving the chains at a combined 50-percent clip (14-for-28). What was most disappointing about the third-down effort against the Buckeyes was the defense’s inability to get off the field on third-and-long. Ohio State, which was faced with an average to-go distance of 7.9 yards on third down, converted three of the five third-and-9 or longer situations it had, including a pair of third-and-10 completions from Julian Sayin to Jeremiah Smith (a 19-yard strike in the first quarter and a 43-yard bomb in the third quarter), which came on two different Buckeye scoring drives (a first-half touchdown drive and a third-quarter field goal). After Ohio State went 5-for-8 on third down in the first half, the 43-yard connection between Sayin and Smith was the only third-down conversion Texas allowed in the second half. The Buckeyes went 1-for-6 trying to move the chains, which Sarkisian credited to Muschamp’s defensive adjustments after a rough start, which included turnovers putting the defense in disadvantageous sudden-change situations (31 of Ohio State’s 37 first-half plays from scrimmage occurred in Longhorn territory). With Texas’ defensive identity a work in progress, Sarkisian indicated the second-half adjustments against the Buckeyes could be what Muschamp does from the jump against the Roadrunners, who are 6-for-24 on third down this season (25-percent conversion rate is tied for 129th nationally). “I thought Ohio State, to their credit, did a lot,” Sarkisian said. “They taxed us mentally with some formations, motion, shifts, alignments that caused a lot of communication, and I didn't think our communication was as good as it could have been. I thought we got better in the second half, but I think we're better defensively right now when we're in your face, when we're aggressive. We tried to play the other way a little bit in the first half and that wasn't, kind of, I think, where our identity is. I thought when we just, kind of, got in your face and played a little bit more aggressive, we played better football. That's probably where our bread and butter is right now, but we need to be more versatile. “We've got to continue to work on those other things.” OTHER STATS TO TRACK — What’s impressive about Texas’ third-down offense goes beyond the 64.5-percent clip at which the Longhorns are converting (No. 5 in FBS). That’s on pace to shatter the Sarkisian-era high of 44.03 percent in 2021. The same is true of the offense’s third-down tries based on a two-game sample. With 31 third-down attempts through two games, the current pace of 15.5 third-down attempts per game would surpass last season (13.5 third-down attempts per game) for the Sarkisian-era high. Typically, Sarkisian’s offense has relied on big plays to move the chains, ranking among the nation’s leaders in percentage of first downs made on first and second down. Instead of trying to avoid third down and score in a hurry, the Longhorns are facing more third downs, converting them at a higher clip and putting together more long drives. After recording 14 scoring drives that amassed 10 or more plays in 2025, Texas has already had six such drives through two games this season, including each of the offense’s last three scoring drives against Ohio State. The trend should continue against a UTSA defense that’s 115th nationally on third down (45.7 percent conversion rate allowed) and 133rd against the run (233 yards per game allowed), with the Roadrunners surrendering more than 5.5 yards per carry. — With the SEC opener on the road against an explosive Tennessee offense (a top-30 offense in the country with 35 10-plus-yard plays and 14 20-plus-yard plays from scrimmage) looming, the Longhorn defense needs to clamp down on allowing big plays. Texas is currently tied for 87th nationally in plays from scrimmage of 10 or more yards allowed (25) and is tied for 96th in FBS with nine 20-plus-yard plays allowed. Most of the damage has been through the air; 18 of the 25 10-yard plays and seven of the nine 20-yard plays have been on passing plays by the opponent. This is another statistical category in which Muschamp’s defense can iron things out before jumping into SEC play. In wins over UTRGV and Texas State, UTSA’s offense has completed 17 passes of 10 or more yards (tied for 74th nationally), with only five of 20 or more yards (tied for 92nd in FBS). View full news story