Maalik Murphy Struggles In Second Texas Longhorns Start, But It Is Not Arch Manning Time
AUSTIN, TX -- The Texas Longhorns survived a major score on Saturday afternoon against the Kansas State Wildcats.
And they did so, in spite of a rough outing from their starting quarterback, Maalik Murphy.
Murphy, who was making his second start of the season in place of the injured Quinn Ewers, had his moments on Saturday, including a pair of beautiful throws to Adonai Mitchell in the first half, one of which went for a touchdown.
Outside of that, as well as a couple of other nice throws, however, Muprhy largely struggled, completing just 19 of his 37 passes for 248 yards with one touchdown and two interceptions.
It should be noted that one of those interceptions was not his fault. However, one of them - as well as another pass that by all rights should have been picked - was.
Murphy struggled so much, in fact, that, (in typical Twitter fashion) fans are now clamoring for Murphy to be benched in favor of Arch Manning on social media.
So what was the biggest issue for Murphy? Trying to do too much.
"What he hopefully can understand is we're going to be an aggressive playcalling team, and he's going to have plenty of opportunities to make throws and do those things," Texas coach Steve Sarkisian said. "Sometimes, similar to last week, your best play is throwing it away and we haven't gotten to that point yet with him."
So, after two underwhelming starts in relief of Ewers, what is next for Murphy and the Longhorns offense?
Well, probably nothing. At least not in terms of Manning.
Maalik Murphy struggled vs. the Kansas State Wildcats on Saturday.
© Ricardo B. Brazziell, Austin American-Statesman
According to reports, the Longhorns are optimistic that Ewers will be able to return for their road trip to Fort Worth to take on TCU next Saturday. And if that is the case, things should go back to normal for the Horns.
Sarkisian also provided a positive update on Ewers, saying that he is "trending in the right direction."
But even in the case that Ewers can't go, Murphy will still likely get the nod against the Frogs.
Why? Because, despite his inexperience and his costly mistakes, Murphy has done his job, leading the Horns to a 2-0 record while Ewers recovers from his injury.
Obviously, those mistakes are far less than ideal, and the Longhorns would love for Murphy to have taken the field against Kansas State and completed 27 of 30 passes for 355 yards and four touchdowns.
But that didn't happen. Instead, Murphy went through some serious growing pains. But that is expected from a young freshman taking on a top-25 team in a critical matchup with Big 12 Championship aspirations on the line. Still, the Longhorns are 8-1 and have everything in front of them.
So does that mean that, if Ewers is unable to go next week vs. TCU, Manning should get the start over Murphy? No. Absolutely not.
Arch Manning warming up for the Texas Longhorns
Scott Wachter-USA TODAY Sports
Why? Because Murphy has earned the right to keep his position as the interim starter, and Steve Sarkisian believes he can do it.
“I wouldn’t have anybody out there if I didn’t think they were good enough to help us win, and Maalik is good enough to help us win,” Sarkisian said. “Again, there’s things in there that hopefully we can grow from in this game that he can continue to improve. When he’s hot, he’s great."
"The key is, not every throw is going to go for that big explosive touchdown play. Sometimes it’s okay the check it down. Sometimes it’s okay to throw it away. It’s okay to punt. That’s fine, but that’s our job as coaches to get them to that point.”
More importantly, despite the struggles, the turnovers, and everything that has not gone Murphy's way in his two starts, he has done what matters - win football games.
Murphy's job was never to come in and light up the scoreboard. He was never expected to come in and play as well or as efficiently as Ewers.
Does he have the talent to do that? Absolutely. But what he didn't possess was the experience.
Manning doesn't have that either. In fact, dollars to donuts, would likely not have performed any better than Murphy has in this position.
Either way, Murphy deserves the right like any other young quarterback to go through growing pains. And just because fans are frustrated in the heat of the game, does not mean Sarkisian needs to make a sudden change to a true freshman without a snap at the college level with a conference title and CFP berth on the line.
With all that said, if Bruce Feldman's reporting is accurate, which it usually is, the Longhorns might not even have to worry about this question next week in Fort Worth.
But if Ewers is unable to go, it should and likely would be Murphy, and not Manning trotting out onto the field for the offense's first snap of the game.
"He should feel like we had the utmost confidence in him because we do,” Sarkisian said.
