AUSTIN, Texas — Texas beat Ohio State 24-23 on Saturday night after running eight plays for 5 total yards in the first quarter and holding the ball for 3:42 of it. The Buckeyes had 8 first downs to the Longhorns’ 1 and led 10-0 after a quarter.
Ohio State led 20-3 at halftime and 23-3 after a 48-yard field goal by Connor Hawkins with 8:09 left in the third quarter.
Texas coach Steve Sarkisian was still making adjustments when he brought the team together in the locker room.
“I think when we first got to the locker room, there was a little bit of shock because we felt like we had a good plan,” Sarkisian said. “We felt like the things we wanted to do, we could do. And then the scoreboard was screwed up, right? It was like, what happened?”
“That’s why I was just trying to get them to focus on looking forward and what the second half was going to look like,” Sarkisian continued. “And let’s get over the first half. We’ve made the adjustments. How are we going to play in the second half? I think there was a level of frustration for some guys. But in the end, it was more about picking them up to say, hey, let’s just go play one play at a time. And they believed it.”
Arch Manning On The Miscommunication
Jeremiah Smith had 6 catches for 110 yards and a 19-yard touchdown in the first half. He was targeted 15 times in the game and did not catch a pass in the fourth quarter.
Ohio State converted 5 of 8 third downs before halftime and 1 of 6 after it, including none of 2 in the fourth quarter.
Arch Manning traced the first-half problems to communication rather than personnel.
“A lot of this stuff had to do with us, like miscommunication, just talking and getting the right spot,” Manning said. “Going into the halftime, I felt like we watched the film, we came together like, look, we go back out there, that is done, right? We can’t go out there and change anything that happened in the first half. And they have talent all across the board over there. So they’re going to make plays, but we can’t kill ourselves.”
“The goal is just to not beat ourselves up and just make sure that if they’re going to make a play, let them make the play on their own,” Manning continued. “We can’t go out there and just give it to them. We weren’t out there just letting them get free shots or letting them run free wide open. We made them earn it. So that was the biggest difference between half one and half two.”
Three Straight Long Drives
Texas outgained Ohio State 239-132 after halftime and held the ball for 19:03 of the second half. The Longhorns ran 27 plays for 150 yards in the fourth quarter alone and converted 4 of 5 third downs in the period.
Ohio State scored 3 points after halftime and none in the fourth quarter, gaining 52 yards on 11 plays.
Texas scored on three straight drives of 15, 13, and 12 plays, covering 91, 72, and 73 yards. Daylan “Hollywood” Smothers ran in from the 1 with 25 seconds left for the 24-23 final. The last pass by Julian Sayin was intercepted by Graceson Littleton at the Texas 40.
Sarkisian’s argument for scheduling the game at all is that a lopsided win would not have produced the same information.
“We could be like some other teams and we could play Jones Junior High tonight and win 66 to nothing, and I don’t know what that does for us,” Sarkisian explained. “What I think it did for us tonight is we found out that we can. And we’ve been close and we’ve been knocking on the door. So I do think that’s helpful for us that we got an opportunity to play in a game like this before we got into conference play against the lead opponent and come out on top.”
Announced attendance was 105,044. Texas is 2-0, moved to No. 1 in the AP Top 25 on Sunday, and hosts UTSA on Sept. 19. Ohio State is 1-1 and hosts Kent State the same day.
