Texas Film Room: How Steve Sarkisian Kept Ohio State Guessing On The Ground

The Texas Longhorns completed an improbable 20-point fourth-quarter comeback against the then-No. 1 Ohio State Buckeyes on Saturday night. Texas dominated that final quarter, due in large part to head coach Steve Sarkisian's rushing game-plan.

Over the game's last six drives, Texas out-gained Ohio State 236 yards to 40, ran 40 plays to the Buckeyes' 12 and controlled the ball for 76% of the final 20 minutes and 47 seconds. They achieved this while running the ball 54% of the time.

That commitment to pounding the ground even in the direst of straits speaks to Sarkisian's confidence in his rushing offense, which was obviously well-founded. Here is why he had that much faith.

How Texas Ran Past Ohio State

Texas Longhorns running back Hollywood Smothers runs against the Ohio State Buckeyes during the first half | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

Texas officially averaged just 3.1 yards per rush on Saturday, however that number jumps to four when not counting sacks and 4.3 if one removes a reverse Texas ran at the end of the second quarter that lost 10 yards. The Longhorns were even more efficient over those final three drives, averaging 4.4 yards per carry.

The Longhorns were great on the ground not only because they invested in backs Hollywood Smothers and Raleek Brown this offseason, but also because Ohio State was never able to key-in on the exact run they would use.

Sarkisian used pre-snap motion, counters, backfield misdirection, pin-pull concepts and much more to keep the Buckeyes consistently off-balance. He ran gap- and zone-scheme runs from under-center, out of the shotgun, in split-backfields and even in empty sets.

Here is a sample of different run concepts he implemented.

While some of these runs were more effective than others, all of them served to keep Texas completely unpredictable. Sarkisian used that unpredictability to build out a strong play-action and RPO passing game, which delivered some of Texas' biggest plays of the night.

Take this one for example:

Texas Longhorns Football — 1st and 10 at TEX 49 - 1:55 3rd Quarter | Carter Long

Texas lines up with three wide receivers to the field and a tight end to the boundary. Ohio State deploys a two-high shell with a quasi-third-safety playing 11-yards off of the line of scrimmage, forcing the Buckeyes to be under-manned in the box.

Ohio State is using something similar to a "Palms" coverage, meaning the cornerbacks are shading outside of the receivers and the safeties must not get beat deep. This leaves the two linebackers and quasi-safety responsible for all routes underneath and in the middle of the field.

Sarkisian, knowing this, calls a run-fake that draws up one of those linebackers and sends Emmett Mosley V on a deep crossing route to run-off the middle-hook defender. This creates a massive hole in the middle of the defense, which Emaree Winston settles right into.

Texas used play-action on 47.7% of Arch Manning's drop-backs, according to Pro Football Focus. Naturally, Sarkisian's play-action and RPO passing-game was just as exotic as the run game was.

Spinner action, misdirection off of motion and pulling pass-protectors were all features of a Texas passing-game which used run fakes out of all manner of sets, formations and personnel groupings.

Here is a sample of those plays.

The Longhorns built their comeback on the foundation of a strong running game, one which should carry them to future victories. If Sarkisian keeps the complexity up, Texas may remain the No. 1 team in the country for a long time.

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