Longhorns Beatdown Of Baylor Proves Texas Is A Big 12 Favorite
This was the win Texas needed.
Yes, needed, not wanted.
Best of luck to Baylor and its future endeavors as members of the Big 12. Thanks for the memories over the past five-plus decades and the parting gift before the No. 3 Longhorns enter the SEC next summer.
A 38-6 win over the one-win Bears isn't something to boast about during sessions at the water cooler. It was expected in Austin following a 34-24 upset victory on the road over the King of college football Nick Saban and Alabama.
Then again, fans expected Texas to throttle Wyoming, and the score was tied at 10 apiece heading into the final 15 minutes of action.
And stop before you start. The Cowboys being a "pesky" opponent isn't a good enough excuse for 131 passing yards by Quinn Ewers.
It won't suffice when putting together a resume for the College Football Playoff.
Yes, Longhorns fans. Those three words can be added to your vocabulary. It's a possibility. A reality? Get past a possible ranked Kansas squad on Saturday first.
Handle business against Oklahoma in Dallas before declaring yourselves "front-runners" in the race to the final four.
But a road win in Waco solidified what Steve Sarkisian already knew. It proved to the players what the preachings in practice have been about.
If the Longhorns can play their style of football for four quarters, they will be hard to defeat. Without a fluke play or a "Kick-Six" 2.0 that rocks the college football community, it might be impossible.
“We have a bunch of guys in that locker room that endured 5-7 a couple of years ago, that came into this stadium and lost a really tough ball game,” Sarkisian said. “So I wanted to make sure that we appreciate these wins.”
Even with several mishaps, the Longhorns (4-0, 1-0 Big 12) marched into McLane Stadium and dismantled the Bears. Ewers rebounded with a 293-yard, two-total touchdown day. Ja'Tavion Sanders and Xavier Worthy looked like future NFL starters and the defense forced Baylor to become one-dimensional on offense.
Jonathon Brooks had 106 yards individually. Baylor mustered up 60 as a team. The Bears settled for two field goals in the first half. Texas would have still won by a point if the offense never took flight after Brooks' 40-yard touchdown run in the first quarter.
Texas is 4-0 for the first time since the Mack Brown era. The offense features a cast of weapons that rotate reps because they're too talented to sit idle on the sidelines. Players like Johntay Cook, Savion Red, Keilan Robinson, and Gunner Helm would likely be starters at smaller schools, but instead have accepted their titles as "roleplayers."
Schools like Alabama have that type of mentality. The same goes for Georgia. Even programs up north like Ohio State, Penn State and Michigan are built that way.
Oh, and the defense continues to make waves. Pete Kwiatkowski needed to build off a promising 2022 campaign headlined by Big 12 Defensive Player of the Year Jaylan Ford. Last season, the Longhorns ranked 28th nationally in scoring and just outside the top 50 in total yards allowed.
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Through the first third of the season, Texas ranks 25th in yards allowed. It ranks 13th in scoring and hasn't allowed more than 24 points in a contest. That was against a seven-time national champion in front of 100,000-plus screaming fans uttering vulgar chants for three hours.
It didn't matter; the Longhorns won by double-digits. Wash, rinse, and repeat at this point of the season.
“5-7, We’ve been there before,” said defensive lineman Byron Murphy II. “We don’t want to go back to that.”
There are still tests ahead, big ones that can derail hopes of bringing home a title for the first time in 18 years. Kansas is undefeated and features one of the game's more electrifying players, Jalon Daniels. Oklahoma's defense is revamped under second-year coach Brent Venables.
Is Dillion Gabriel perfect? No, but neither is Ewers, so it's a moot point until the whistle blows at the Cotton Bowl and ends an era of the game being a Big 12 staple.
Kansas, Oklahoma, and even Kansas State won't fumble the opportunities to score on a Longhorns' blunder like Baylor did. Worthy muffed a punt that led to a Bears' field goal. Jordan Whittington did the same thing in the second half, but this time, the defense forced a turnover on downs.
Bert Auburn missed a chip-shot 28-yard field goal to extend the Longhorns' lead by 25. Sawyer Robertson connected twice on passes 25 yards downfield, including a 55-yard pass to Montary Baldwin.
Anything else? Outside of a couple of drops, mistimed throws and a few first-down conversions, Texas did its job. It became a one-way ticket to a beatdown that now put Dave Aranda in an uncomfortable spot on the hot seat meter.
"I thought our guys were just really poised," said Sarkisian. "They were communicating really well on the field, I thought they were taking in really good information from us on the sideline and then they were applying it on the field."
The Longhorns are thriving. They're compiling a resume worth discussing if seeding for the route to NRG Stadium becomes a factor. They're also proving winning away from DRK won't be a problem if they follow the blueprint.
No, it's not time to buy plane tickets for a Rose Bowl or Sugar Bowl trip. It's not even time to start mapping out the fastest route to Arlington for the Big 12 Championship.
But the Longhorns are different this year. They're acting different, too.
Teams of the past would have celebrated defeating an in-state rival one final time like it was their Super Bowl.
It was just another day at the office for Sark and Co. on Saturday evening.
