Sometimes, you just have to count your lucky stars and take whatever good fortune comes your way. Texas did damn near everything it could to give this game away in the second half, but in the end it was Kansas State that made a couple costly errors late in the game to help the Longhorns secure the victory and keep their Big 12 Championship hopes alive. This wasn’t an elimination game by definition, but it may as well have been with so many teams bunched up at the top of the Big 12 standings. The Longhorns survive another week in what was a maddening game at times.
I’m not sure I can remember seeing a team dominate a game so thoroughly at times, but look completely lost in other times. For most of the first half, Texas made K-State look like a junior varsity team, only to have the script flipped in the second half. The Texas offense is what it is with a back-up quarterback running the show, but the inconsistency of the Texas defense is hard to figure out. When opponents decide to throw the ball around – even when Texas KNOWS the other team is going to be throwing the ball – the Longhorns have a hard time finding answers. It nearly cost Texas in this one.
Other random thoughts as the game unfolded …
Maalik Murphy looked pretty comfortable early but that false start penalty by JT Standers on the first drive was a killer. That’s the type of mental mistake that you don’t expect from a young player, much less someone as experienced and valuable by Sanders. Texas nearly converted that 3rd-and-10 but K-State isn’t the type of team that you can afford to give free yardage to.
Back-to-back weeks with a sack for Barryn Sorrell. Maybe he’s starting to heat up for a big stretch run?
Jonathon Brooks limped off the field in the first quarter. Texas can’t have that. Brooks is pretty durable so I’d be surprised if he doesn’t play through that but Texas needs him healthy. He’d later hobble off again but once again returned and played well when he got back in action.
Beautiful strike from Maalik Murphy to Adonai Mitchell from 37-yards out to put Texas up 7-0. That ball dropped over Mitchell’s shoulder perfectly.
No sooner did I praise Maalik Murphy for how comfortable he looked in the first quarter, how accurate he was, how he was going through his progressions and making smart decisions … the next throw he badly overshoots Xavier Worthy and right after that nearly throws an interception in the end zone. Such is life with an inexperienced quarterback I guess.
Great start for the Texas defense in making K-State one dimensional, and then taking the QB run game out of the equation. The defensive line held up well early on, the linebacker play against Will Howard was good and Pete Kwiatkowski did a good job of calling pressure packages when KSU went to Avery Johnson.
Texas outgained Kansas State 173 yards to 24 in that first quarter … didn’t see that coming.
Fourth-and-one from their own 46-yard-line and Sark goes for it, as usual. The way the offense lined up I thought it might be a QB sneak. LOVED the call to go a more traditional route (rather than Wildcat or jumbo package) and loved the call to toss it to Baxter to get him away from all the congestion. The result … a missed tackle and Baxter off to the races for a touchdown.
After Baxter’s touchdown run, Texas had outgained K-State 246 to 26. Incredible.
I’m not really sure who to fault on that interception that Murphy threw where Johntay Cook fell down. On one hand, you’d expect Cook to stay up and fight through that contact. On the other hand, sometimes you just have a bit of bad luck and there seemed to be some of that on that play. I’ll give them both a pass on that play until I get a chance to really dissect what happened.
Okay, I can’t hate on the second fourth-down call too much after the first one worked so well. Texas went wildcat again and Savion Red dropped the snap, dooming the play before it had a chance. The Longhorns actually had a couple receivers out in routes on that play so it looked like Red may have been looking to pass … but we’ll never know after things crashed and burned from the start. All that being said, I’m going to repeat for the third straight game. Take. The. Points.
People will point to that decision to go for it on fourth down instead of kicking the field goal as a mistake and something that turned the game to KSU to some degree. I get it. But that play really didn’t K-State up for a score. It, of course, took points off the board for Texas but the Longhorns forced a three-and-out after that call, forced a punt and actually got the ball in decent field position. It was the blocked punt that really turned the tide late in the first half to set up K-State to get on the scoreboard.
I was prepared to write how Texas dominated the first half of this game in just about every way possible, only to have Texas implode in the last few minutes of the half with fourth-down mistakes, near interceptions, getting a punt blocked and then porous play on the defensive side of the ball. This game could have been over in the first half, and instead Texas let K-State hang around to make things interesting going into the break.
As good as Maalik Murphy looked early in the game, he was equally bad late in the second half. Some of those throws he missed were tosses he probably made pretty easily as a middle schooler. He just lost his rhythm and he better get it back or Texas might be in trouble.
Some first-half stats of interest … Maalik Murphy 175 yards, 1 TD, 1 INT … K-State 28 yards on 17 carries … Adonai Mitchell 4 targets, 4 receptions, 101 yards and 1 TD … Texas 5 tackles for loss … Texas 0-6 on third down … K-State 1-7 on third down.
I told the OB crew in our Slack channel that Texas better not let K-State score on the first drive of the second half or this one could be trouble. A few minutes later, Michael Taafe with a huge interception for the second week in a row. That was a fortunate break for Texas because it looked like the K-State receiver had made the catch for a huge gain, but Taafe was once again in the right spot at the right time to come up with a huge play.
Welcome back, Ethan Burke. Really good performance by him today, including a couple big sacks and that strip sack in the third quarter that really put Texas in a great spot to take control of the game. One play after that sack, Jonathon Brooks punches it in from 5-yards out behind some really good blocking and Texas had pushed the lead to 24-7.
Jonathon Brooks officially went over the 1,000-yard mark on the season with that big 27-yard run in the third quarter. I thought Brooks might surprise people with his play this year, but he has far exceeded expectations.
When Texas went up 27-7, it almost felt like the defense lost some of its killer instinct on that following drive. Kansas State made it look pretty easy despite having a few offensive penalties in marching down the field, 75 yards on eight plays for a touchdown to cut things to 27-14 heading into the fourth quarter. The damage was all done through the air but Pete Kwiatkowski couldn’t have been happy with that series.
I’ll wait for Alex’s grades next week but I thought Cam Williams actually played pretty well … when he wasn’t committing pre-snap penalties. That obviously needs to be cleaned up, and will be.
What in the world was Maalik Murphy doing on that screen pass to Jonathon Brooks? How did he not see that Brooks got hung up in traffic and was not out there where the play was designed to go? I get that Maalik is young but that kind of mistake just cannot happen.
Two plays after that disastrous INT, K-State scores to cut the lead to 27-20. You think Sark wishes he’d kicked that chip shot field goal in the first half right about now?
Two plays after the touchdown pass, Jonathon Brooks fumbles and Kansas State recovers. What a collapse by Texas and an uncharacteristic mistake by Brooks. Next play, touchdown Kansas State and the Wildcats tie the game after KSU botched the PAT. Unfathomable collapse by Texas.
What a huge response by Maalik Murphy after Kansas State tied the game up. Murphy came up big with some nice throws, including a clutch fourth-down completion to JT Sanders. That drive would wind up stalling and Texas would have to settle for a field goal, but those were some pressure passes that Murphy was able to complete to get Texas into scoring position.
Bert Auburn deserves an atta-boy in this game. Three field goal attempts, three makes, including a 49-yarder.
Ryan Watts, you have to peel off on that play on the sidelines. You can’t give the officials ANY reason to throw that flag.
Was there any doubt that Kansas State was going to get into field goal range, at worst, or maybe even score a touchdown when they got the ball back following the Texas field goals? This Texas defense had no answer for Will Howard and the K-State passing attack in the second half. Fortunately …
What a dumb call by K-State to go QB run on third and short late in the game. The QB run game hadn’t worked all day, the middle of the Texas defense had been dominant and they decided to run it right up the gut with Will Howard? Not smart. Of course, Texas dropped Howard for a loss and then K-State missed a chip-shot field goal. You think KSU would like to have that sequence back? Terrible third-down logic and terrible execution on the field goal.
When this game went to overtime, it favored Kansas State (field goal kicking aside). The Wildcats had been much more effective on offense than Texas and an inexperienced QB in overtime is not a recipe for success. But KSU coach Kleinman rolled the dice (stupidly, IMO) after Texas went three-and-out and came up snake eyes.
Overall grade for Maalik Murphy would have to be a D. I'm not sure the one interception was fully his fault but the attempted screen pass INT was pretty bad, and he missed several throws that even he would tell you he should have made. Maalik once again showed flashes of his talent, but the consistency isn't yet there, which is somewhat to be expected.
Holy crap. What a finish. With that, I’m off to a wedding. I hope it’s an open bar after the way this game went down to the wire.
