Welcome to Bevo’s Fake Nuts, our weekly column on the Texas Longhorns.
We come bearing bad news for the Big 12:
It appears that Texas may be tough.
On and off over the last ten or twelve years, Texas football has been defined by complacency. Exasperated boosters have lamented Austin becoming “too fun” as high-level recruits fail to develop into high-level players. Exasperated fans have grown accustomed to gutting collapses and upset losses at home. But while there’s still time for these issues to rear their heads once more, Saturday night was not what the narrative would suggest.
On Saturday night, UTSA came up I-35 and punched Texas in the mouth. The Roadrunners—college football’s latest Little Engine That Could, fresh off a defiant twelve-win season—raced out to a ten-point second quarter lead, putting a Texas team playing its backup quarterback all the way on its heels.
Except.
Except Texas didn’t stay on its heels.
Except Texas answered.
Except Texas tied the game by halftime and then spent the third and fourth quarter bullying one of their many little brothers.
Texas should be expected to overpower the front sevens of the likes of UTSA time and time again. That doesn’t make it less noteworthy that they did. Texas should be expected to have a fringe Heisman candidate every year. That doesn’t make it less noteworthy that Bijan Robinson is flirting with the picture. Texas should come into every buy game hungry to kick ass. That doesn’t make it less noteworthy that, warts and all, they handily beat a team on par with the Big 12’s lower reaches.
This last part leaves plenty of room for concern. UTSA, a fine-not-great team, was a test, but it shouldn’t have been a test. Texas Tech and West Virginia, similarly, should not be tests, though Texas Tech may still have a little Sonny Cumbie magic left in the tank from last year, and Lubbock is famously hostile to Longhorns. Quinn Ewers is working his way back, and it sounds like he’ll be back for Oklahoma, but there are dual risks ahead these next two weeks: the risk the Horns let an inferior opponent test them a little bit too much, and the risk two more wins against medium-bad foes feeds overconfidence heading up to Dallas.
So far, Texas is passing the test. So far, Texas is answering the bell. So far, Texas is raising expectations. The offensive line did enough on Saturday night. The defense didn’t bow in the second half. Hudson Card played to his ceiling, keeping the engine fine-tuned for Ewers. Time will tell, but it’s possible these Horns have it. It’s possible Texas, once again, is tough.
