AUSTIN, Texas — Ranked No. 1 in both major polls after Saturday’s stunning comeback against the Ohio State Buckeyes, the Texas Longhorns are nonetheless far from a finished product with one non-conference game remaining before SEC play opens against the Tennessee Volunteers in Nashville.
“We were not perfect, okay, and we’ve got plenty of things to work on,” Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian said on Monday.
The primary emphasis is on protecting the football better. After Arch Manning threw an interception
in the end zone just before halftime against Texas State, ball security was a major issue for Texas against Ohio State with four fumbles, a shocking breakdown in technique after the Longhorns reduced their lost fumbles from 12 in 2024 to two last season.
“Our ball security is awful right now, if you want to know the truth, and that’s not something that we take pride in at all. We take pride in our ability to take care of the ball, and so we have got to improve our ball security because it wasn’t just about the turnovers, it was the other fumbles,” Sarkisian said.
As Texas mounted a long drive that spanned the end of the third quarter and the start of the fourth quarter, the comeback almost never got going because wide receiver Emmett Mosley wasn’t protecting the football well enough at the end of a 15-yard reception to convert a 3rd and 9. Luckily for the Horns, fellow wide receiver Cam Coleman was able to jump on the football even though there were multiple Buckeyes defenders in the vicinity who had better odds of recovering it.
For the offense, the positive is that Mosley had four more receptions before the game ended and finished each one with much more intention by keeping two hands on the football.
That drive had only started because cornerback Kade Phillips benefitted from some similar fumble luck after a punt by Ohio State hit return man Ryan Niblett in the face mask before bouncing at a Buckeyes player on punt coverage.
After Ohio State failed to recover either fumble, Texas finally scored its first touchdown of the game at the 14:19 mark of the fourth quarter.
Carelessness with the ball extended to Manning trying to shovel a pass to running back Raleek Brown while under heavy pressure in the pocket on a play from the Ohio State 15-yard line on the second touchdown drive, an ill-advised decision that counted as a forward pass, but could have been disastrous.
And before the Horns were able to score the touchdown that tied the game before the go-ahead extra point, running back Hollywood Smothers fumbled near the goal line on second down, a ball that tight end Emaree Winston was able to recover in heavy traffic to maintain possession.
On the first play from scrimmage, the fumble by Brown on a screen pass was indicative of the team’s early struggles. Sarkisian dialed up a play call into the boundary in the expectation of a field pressure that came, setting up two perimeter blockers against two Ohio State defenders. But Mosley got blown up by freshman cornerback Jay Timmons and driven by into Brown, who fumbled when Timmons knocked the ball out with his leg.
“Fundamentally, we were incorrect,” Sarkisian said. “We’ve got the ball on our inside arm. He doesn’t have a weapon to help make the safety miss. The ball comes out.”
The Buckeyes recovered and kicked a field goal to take an early 3-0 lead.
“We have got to value the football more in the organization than we have through two games,” Sarkisian said.
Third-down defense is another area of concern for Sarkisian — Texas is currently tied for last in the SEC as opponents are converting 50 percent of their third downs against the Longhorns. Although it’s a small sample size through two games, the current struggles reflect major regression from last season, when Texas finished third in the conference with a third-down conversion rate of only 33.5 percent against Pete Kwiatkowski’s defense.
In the win over the Buckeyes, there was some improvement, as Texas held Ohio State to 6-of-14 (42.9 percent), but that only looks like improvement because Texas State converted at 57.1 percent in the season opener.
“We’re too good up front with our pass rushes, we’re too good with our coverages to be last in the Southeastern Conference in third down defense right now,” Sarkisian said.
Increasing the frustration level for Sarkisian is the frequent success that the Longhorns had an early downs — the Buckeyes averaged 7.9 yards to go on third down, almost three yards longer than Texas offensively, but went 3-of5 on 3rd and 9 or more, situations in which the Horns absolutely have to get off the field defensively.
Midway through the first quarter, Texas forced Ohio State into 3rd and 10 inside Longhorns territory, but Will Muschamp opted against bringing pressure, settling for a twist from a four-man rush, so Julian Sayin had plenty of time to stand in the pocket and wait for Jeremiah Smith to find a hole in the Texas zone defense for 19 yards. Just too easy for the Buckeyes.
To close the drive, Ja’Kobi Jackson ran for an eight-yard touchdown on 3rd and 4 when defensive end Lance Jackson missed a tackle near the line of scrimmage and Jackson dragged linebacker Justin Cryer into the end zone.
In the second quarter, Ohio State converted a 3rd and 13 when Sayin found Brandon Inniss made a 19-yard reception. Once again, Muschamp opted against sending extra pass rushers and Inniss was able to get open against linebacker Rasheem Biles, who is effective in coverage, but is a poor matchup against Inniss.
Fortunately for the Horns, the pass rush was finally able to get to Sayin two plays later and the defense was able to force a field goal, one of the important stops by the Texas defense in the first half.
Later in the game, when Muschamp was calling more press man coverage on the outside to send a safety into the box to slow down the Ohio State running game, the Buckeyes were able to take advantage of cornerback Warren Roberson squatting at the sticks on 3rd and 10 on a stutter and go by Smith that gained 43 yards.
In press coverage against a receiver of that quality, you’re inevitably going to give up something, but in this case Smith was able to use Roberson’s aggressiveness against him for a field-flipping play that set up a 48-yard field goal to put the Buckeyes up by 20 points midway through the third quarter.
“It’s a heck of a throw by Julian with a free runner in his face, hitting him on the double move down our sideline, but we didn’t panic,” Sarkisian said.
As Muschamp tries to determine whether Texas can play effective defense in zone coverage with honest pass rushes so the Longhorns have the versatility to utilize different styles, the team needs to improve in those two key areas.
“I’m very honest, and so I got on the offense’s butt this morning about the ball. Like our ball security is not good enough, not to be a championship team. Our third-down defense right now is not good enough, not to be a championship team. And that’s not to diminish the win, that’s to show them how we can continue to improve and where there’s area for improvement. We’re not a finished product yet,” Sarkisian said.
So the Texas head coach showed his team the famous quote from Kobe Bryant in the 2009 NBA Finals.
“We’ve got to stay on the grind. We’ve got to continue to push forward,” Sarkisian said.
