Five quick thoughts: Texas crushes ULM

The ULM Warhawks were 38.5 point underdogs in this game for a reason, but Texas still covered the spread in a dominant Week 1 win.

The game was most everything Texas wanted, sans the exciting deep shots by Quinn Ewers to star receiver Xavier Worthy. Much like in 2021, the Longhorns are seeing some delays in connecting down the field but the rest of the offense got humming and the defense smothered the Warhawks in this commanding win.

Some initial impressions…

Quick thought no. 1: An inauspicious start on offense

The opening drive can’t have been how Ewers wanted to start his Texas career. First he missed a deep throw to Worthy which was nearly picked by the deep safety. Then on 3rd down he rolled out of the pocket and hurled another ball into coverage which was intercepted.

From there Steve Sarkisian slowed things down and fed Ewers a manageable diet of rollouts, screens, and a few RPOs. After the bad 0-2 start, he finished 16-24 for 225 yards at 9.4 ypa with two touchdown passes and the aforementioned interception.

The start was really bad, but once he settled in and you saw Sark guiding him through the game with play-action underneath and easier reads like he did Casey Thompson early in 2021, you could also see the talent slowly start to bloom. The ball simply explodes out of his hand which makes it very easy to scheme up ways to spread the ball around the field and open up room for the run game.

As he started to move around later in the game and make things happen on the move you could see some of his game-changing ability to deal damage off-schedule as well. He’s going to have growing pains like all the Horn quarterbacks before him, but the talent is evident. Some of Ewers’ connections to Sanders on the move were really eye-opening.

Quick thought no. 2: They’ve got a lot of defense installed

Texas is still a base 3-4 defense which plays most of the time in a 2-4-5 nickel package. Barryn Sorrell has emerged as the Jack linebacker who plays to the field and helps set the edge but they’d sub him out in base defense for another defensive tackle while sliding DeMarvion Overshown out to Sam linebacker. It’s a good base defense which will be useful for games this season where opponents play with bigger personnel.

The 2-4-5 made a lot of sense for this game on those snaps where ULM tried to spread the field only to run zone-option in the box. It was difficult for ULM to attack the edge against those Edge linebackers.

On 3rd downs they’d play Overshown as an Edge OR they’d play with a 3-down line and have Overshown drift around into different gaps as a blitzer. On one of Sorrell’s sacks they had Overshown prowling around inside only to drop in coverage so they could blitz both of the inside linebackers. This left Sorrell some space on the edge to go 1-on-1 with the right tackle, a battle he won decisively.

Texas played well on defense, the safeties were pretty aggressive and Cook looked comfortable opening the game at field safety and closing ground on plays in front of him. The Warhawks had only 259 yards of total offense and were 6-16 on 3rd down. It appears Pete Kwiatkowski has a lot up his sleeve for this season and the players look comfortable in it.

Quick thought no. 3: The edges are upgraded

On both sides of the ball, Texas is better on the edges of the line of scrimmage than they were a year ago. Kelvin Banks is clearly a natural tackle and simply capable of more there than Texas got in 2021. Pairing him with Hayden Conner (who stepped in for Banks at left tackle for a play when he tweaked the ankle) on the left side gives Texas a ton of size, athleticism, and power in the tandem.

Texas’ Edge positions are also clearly upgraded. Ovie Oghoufo was solid, they got good snaps from multiple players including the freshmen, Overshown got into the mix, and Barryn Sorrell was a revelation. 1.5 sacks by the Jack with some really nice work with his hands.

You’ll recall from the preview that ULM is a zone-option team with a mobile quarterback who wanted to run zone-option plays in this game. Well, the Edges contained them and sent the ball inside to die. The Warhawks ran the ball 41 times for 91 yards on the day at 2.2 ypc with a late touchdown against the 3rd string defense. The Longhorns only ran the ball 29 times but picked up 134 yards (sack yardage included) and scored three touchdowns.

Quick thought no. 4: Ja’Tavion Sanders has a massive role in this offense

Quite a game for the sophomore, six catches for 85 yards and a touchdown, Ewers’ first. The touchdown play design was nice, Texas was giving that look from double tight end and double running back sets, releasing one back or tight end to the flat and bringing the other across to block on split zone. There was a lot of intentional design within the offense geared around involving Sanders in the passing game.

They flexed him out, they kept him on the field in 11 personnel, they played him off-ball in 12 personnel so he could motion around, and he ran routes.

Beyond those factors though, Ewers also has a lot of comfort with him. The deadly gunslinger vision of Ewers appeared most real when he was freelancing and finding Sanders on the move. Especially on the connection up the seam when Ewers stepped up in the pocket.

Thus far in his development, Ewers is probably most comfortable throwing on the move and finding his running backs and tight ends underneath. As it happens, Texas has a lot of NFL talent at those positions. Many of the great Texas quarterbacks of yesteryear also had strong connections with great tight ends to guide them through their first seasons.

Quick thought no. 5: Very strong team win

Texas covered the point spread quite easily while playing virtually everyone on the roster. Special teams were a little mixed. They opened the game with special teams points obviously and Xavier Worthy had several long returns while ULM generally conceded decent field position on kickoffs with pooch kicks.

Isaac Pearson mishandled a punt snap and a field goal hold so there were certainly some problem spots to be sorted out. You can see the upside though, Jeff Banks is aggressive with special teams opportunities.

D’Shawn Jamison scored 12 points in this game with the punt block return and pick-6. The defense smothered ULM all night until they emptied the bench late in the game.

They were facing an overmatched opponent, but Texas showed explosive play-making potential in all three phases tonight. Bijan Robinson quietly had 111 total yards and two touchdowns on just 13 touches and the team has some NFL talent across the roster.

They’ll need it next week.