Live Notes from No. 3 Texas vs Baylor

Follow along as I jot down notes during Texas’s week four matchup against the Baylor Bears. This article will be updated throughout Saturday night.

Pregame:

• On Monday, Baylor head coach Dave Aranda stated that it was unlikely that Bears starting quarterback Blake Shapen would be healthy enough to start against the Longhorns. Shapen has missed Baylor’s last two games due to an MCL injury. However, Shapen is practicing in pregame warmups and appears to be a game-time decision for Aranda.

First Quarter:

• To no real surprise, Baylor redshirt sophomore quarterback Sawyer Robertson gets his third start in-a-row at quarterback for the Bears.
• While the Texas defense had a rough go of things on Baylor’s last drive of the first quarter, the defensive front has been incredible thus far. In fact, during the first nine minutes of play, the defense had tallied three sacks.
• Jett Bush, Byron Murphy II, & Vernon Broughton all with early first quarter sacks.
• Nice job by Jonathon Brooks to find the end zone early on a 40-yard touchdown rush. Last weekend against Wyoming, Brooks tallied 164 yards on the ground but did not come away with a touchdown.

Second Quarter:

• The Longhorns secondary has not had their best start so far, with a defensive pass interference on Michael Taaffe and a miscue by Jerrin Thompson.
• However, the defensive front has helped to pick up some of the slack thus far.
• One thing that Xavier Worthy has struggled with so far this season on special teams is letting punts roll for extra yards – to the detriment of the team’s field position. In the second quarter, Worthy picked up a punt, that he would have oftentimes let bounce around, and took it across midfield. Hopefully, this is a sign of maturity on special teams for Worthy, the star receiver who actually did not field punts at the high school level.
• Well… maybe I jinxed that last one. Worthy’s muffed point resulted in three points for Baylor.
• The Longhorn running backs have been having themselves a decent game so far tonight. Jonathon Brooks has two first half touchdowns while freshman CJ Baxter was able to score his first career touchdown.
• What I liked most about Texas’s second quarter, besides from a momentary let down from special teams, is that they were able to put their feet on the accelerator – something that the team has seemingly struggled with right before halftime in recent games.

Halftime Thoughts:

• Overall, if you are a Longhorn fan, you should be pleased with the first half.
• The Longhorns defensive front has feasted thus far.
• For the most part, the Texas offense did not stall in the second quarter and made the contest a three possession game.
• The main downside in today’s game has been miscues in the secondary and Worthy’s muffed punt.
• While both are less than ideal for Steve Sarkisian’s Longhorns, the defense has limited damage and has only allowed six points through the first two quarters.

Third Quarter:

• Every time that the Texas secondary has let up a big play, the rest of the defense has bounced back and held their own. This time, Longhorns linebacker Jaylan Ford tallied his second interception of the year, this time with Baylor in the red zone.
• I have said it before but it is promising that the Texas defense has been able to help the team win games this season. Longhorns fans have not seen that in a while.
• Third down conversions have been a sore spot for the Longhorns so far in 2023, so it was good to see Quinn Ewers move the chains against Baylor with a deep 51-yard pass to freshman Johnny Cook. Even better for the Longhorns? They capitalized on this with a touchdown just two plays later when Ewers found Xavier Worthy on a 21-yard completion.
• What is going on with Texas’s punt returns? The team has muffed two tonight, one by Xavier Worthy and now one by Jordan Whittington. It is too early to have a knee-jerk reaction but you can feel confident that punt return will be more of a focus in practice next week.

Fourth Quarter:

• The difficult part about not being able to score points when you are up big is that it limits the amount of time that backups have in the game. It is already hard enough to sprinkle them into the contest routinely, so you have to provide yourself with a sizable cushion so you can substitute them into the game early.
• With that said, the defense was able to substitute early in the fourth quarter and the Longhorns were able to put Maalik Murphy in at quarterback.