Longhorns Update: Great Game, Or Was It?

I guess at first glance, this weekend’s University of Texas football game was a good one. How can you complain about a final score of 43 – 0? A shutout is always a great thing.

It was a beautiful evening for a game. The temperatures are finally starting to drop a little, and this is the first time all season that I actually had to take a light jacket to the game. College football weather – at least what I would consider college football weather – is upon us.

This week’s victim was Kansas. Rumor has it that they brought a team from Lawrence, Kansas to play the Longhorns. Let’s just say it must have been 3:06 worth of despair for the Jayhawks. There was no Rock, no Chalk, and little Jayhawk. It was a far cry from the KU basketball team who, by the way, might have scored as many points as the football team if not a few more. And they only start 5 players.

The Texas defense held the Jayhawks to 46 total yards. Yes, you read that correctly – 46 yards. They looked pretty dominant.

The Texas offense ran up 590 yards. That’s enough offense for 2 games – we might want to put some of those yards in the bank for a future crisis. The running game accounted for 441 of those yards. That, my friends, is a dominant ground game if ever there was one.

But – well, there is a big “but” here. Please remember who their opponent was – the Kansas Jayhawks, a team that is in the bottom of most statistical categories nationally and the owner of a 2 – 6 overall record, 0 – 5 in Big 12 action. It wouldn’t be terribly difficult for a defense to look dominant against them. It wouldn’t be terribly difficult for a decent running game to thrash them.

When you look at the Longhorns’ passing game, it is still littered with 5 yard pass plays. Sure, the running game is back on track, but a good defense will stack the line and force quarterback David Ash to throw downfield. It will require more than a 5 or 10 yard passing attack to open up the game should this happen. At this point, the passing game is tentative at best: loaded with potential, but still questionable.

For now, we can savor the moment. But there are still some loaded games down the line against Texas Tech, Kansas State, Texas A&M (at Aggieland for one final time), and Baylor (at Waco). They are one win away from being bowl eligible. Let’s just hope they play as well as they did this weekend. They may need every bit of it.

Note: If the reports are correct, Garrett Gilbert is transferring to SMU. I think this will be a great fit. I am still of the belief that Gilbert is a great raw talent that suffered from poor tutelage by the UT offensive coaching staff (read: Greg Davis). Don’t forget how as a freshman he came off the bench to lead the Longhorns in the National Championship game. It was a tremendous effort for a true freshman given how little time he’d been on the field all year. Not long after, in the midst of a 5 – 7 season, UT fans wanted him gone. It wasn’t all his doing – the team around him stunk just as badly. I think he will flourish under the watchful gaze of SMU coach June Jones. Good luck, Garrett – I for one wish you all the best.

Photo credits: abesselink