Texas looked every bit like a national title team against Ole Miss on Saturday night in Austin - and still, that might not be enough.
No. 19 Texas beat No.
7 Ole Miss 34-27 in front of 104,306 at Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium, a result that should have felt routine after a dominant first half. Instead, it turned into another nerve-wracker for a Longhorns team that keeps making life harder than it needs to be.
The good news for Steve Sarkisian: this one ended in the win column. The bad news: Texas once again watched a big lead shrink into a full-blown fourth-quarter problem.
The Longhorns led 24-3 at halftime, then let Ole Miss claw all the way back to a tie. Ole Miss never actually took the lead, but it did recover an onside kick with 90 seconds left and got a final shot at the end zone on a Hail Mary that was intercepted.
So yes, Texas survived. But it also showed, in one game, nearly every version of itself.
“It’s about us,” Sarkisian said after the game. “We were not perfect tonight.
We had an opportunity to be closer to be perfect. There are things in the game we need to fix.
I’m proud of the team, [but] there is even better [version] out there for us. There’s going to need to be better from us.”
For the first half, Texas played like the best team in the country. Arch Manning got rid of the ball quickly, especially on slant routes, and for 30 minutes he was the best quarterback on the field. Texas’ offense moved cleanly, the defense bottled up Ole Miss quarterback Trinidad Chambliss and running back Kewan Lacy, and the Rebels managed only three first-half points, their fewest in a half since 2023.
The one blemish on the opening half was a dropped touchdown by wide receiver Cam Coleman, who had what looked like an easy score slip away.
Manning, who has taken plenty of heat over the last two weeks, made it clear he noticed.
“I had a chip on my shoulder all week,” Manning said after the game. “You know, I’ve been hyped up all my life, I think I like being disregarded, and counted out.”
Texas looked every bit deserving of the 24-3 cushion. It also looked every bit like a team capable of blowing it, because that’s been part of the story lately.
This was the third straight game Texas coughed up a double-digit lead. It led Oklahoma by 10 and lost.
It led Florida 17-3 in the second quarter and lost. Against Ole Miss, the unraveling started when Ole Miss sacked Manning early in the second half, then recovered his fumble in the end zone for a touchdown.
“We got the whole trifecta in the play,” Sarkisian said, “and momentum. You let them hang around they are going to start to make plays.”
Ole Miss kept making them. The Rebels scored twice more, and suddenly the comfortable afternoon had turned into the sort of game Texas keeps inviting into its life. Texas still had enough to close it out, but not before Ole Miss assembled one last push that ended with that late Hail Mary and an interception.
The Longhorns didn’t finish the game through the air. They did it on the ground, rushing for 212 yards and helping move the game out of danger. But even that came with the usual Texas tax: 14 penalties for 134 yards, three turnovers, and special teams that Sarkisian’s team would probably like to erase from memory.
“It’s a dangerous way to live,” Sarkisian said of the team’s penalties and turnovers.
Texas now has five games left, three of them on the road. With the exception of its Nov. 14 trip to LSU, the Longhorns will likely be favored in each one.
They’re good enough to win out. They’re good enough to win a national title.
They’ve already beaten No. 1 and No. 7.
And yet the bigger picture is still messy. Texas has two SEC losses already, and that means the path to the title is brutally narrow. This team may be one of the best in the country, but the margin for error is almost gone.
Sarkisian can complain about the schedule if he wants. The Florida game will always be there.
So will the SEC. But Texas keeps giving away pieces of its own case, one penalty, one turnover, one blown lead at a time.
On Saturday night, it showed all of it at once.
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