The Morning After: Texas – Rice

Post-Notre Dame, the outlook for this Texas Longhorns football team was nothing more than doom and gloom. South Bend came crashing down on the Longhorns and it looked like there was no way out of the abyss.

Then, the Rice game happened.

A glimmer of hope can be found in Austin. No guarantees of greatness. No guarantees of wins. But a glimmer of hope the Longhorns haven’t had in nearly six seasons.

Jerrod Heard proved his abilities as a starting quarterback last night against the Rice Owls. The two-time high school state champion made big plays happen for the offense, which has been stale for quite some time. Heard’s performance last night was only a teaser of what he brings to the offense. With a good Cal team looming, expect coaches to let Heard loose when the Longhorns and Golden Bears meet in Austin.

While last night’s win was exactly what the Longhorns needed, the team only netted 277 yards of total offense. Coupled with a poor offensive showing at Notre Dame, Texas ranks 126th out of 127 FBS teams in total offense. Only Akron ranks lower.

Special teams and defense stole the show for the ‘Horns. The special teams scored 14 points and managed huge punt return yardage, which the offense benefitted from tremendously. Defensively the Longhorns created five turnovers. Vance Bedford’s unit also gave up a whopping 462 yards of offense to the Rice Owls. The Texas defense is now ranked 114th in the country in total defense. The run defense was gashed by Driphus Jones, Sam Stewart and the rest of the Rice running game. Lightly put, the Texas defensive line got pushed around most of the night by the Rice offensive line.

If these statistics continue to hold their places for the rest of the season, it’s going to be a long year in Austin.

But, there is still a glimmer.

Texas has its first win of the season, and last night, started to resemble a football team that has an identity under new quarterback Jerrod Heard.

Other College Football Thoughts

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[*]The SEC is very OVERRATED. After a week in which the Top 25 featured 10 Southeastern Conference teams, it will likely have only 7 this upcoming week. Arkansas got embarrassed. Tennesseeblew a 17 point lead in an overtime loss to the Sooners. Auburn struggled mightily with JACKSONVILLE STATE. And yes, Missouri struggled with Arkansas State. It was a bad day for many SEC teams.

 

[*]Yesterday is why I love college football. I saw three overtime games, a great finish in the Notre Dame-Virginia game and a great Top-10 matchup. Why can’t we have college football year-round?

 

[*]The Big 12 had a decent Saturday. Except for Iowa State and Kansas – they were bad.

 

[*]The Big 10 had the best day of the Power-5 conferences. Michigan slaughtered Oregon State in Harbaugh’s home opener. Iowa beats Iowa State to claim the state and both Wisconsin and Ohio State won big. To wrap up the night, the Michigan State Spartans won a huge game against Oregon that could have college football playoff implications.

 

[*]Want a darkhorse for the national title? The USC Trojans. They are really good and Cody Kessler looks to be the real deal. I think the Trojans stay undefeated until they meet Oregon in November.

 

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