Kirk Herbstreit said he wasn't taking Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian at face value when it came to his fourth-quarter play calls, but it certainly sounded like it.
And after the Longhorns lost 28-14 to Ohio State in the College Football Playoff semifinals, costing Texas a chance at a national championship, ESPN analysts weren't alone.
The play in question occurred on second-and-goal from the 1-yard line, with Texas leading by a touchdown, with just over three minutes left in the fourth quarter.
After Jerick Gibson was stopped for no gain on a first-and-goal rushing attempt, Sarkisian went for a pitch play to running back Quintrevion Wisner, who was tackled for a seven-yard loss.
After Quinn Ewers' incomplete pass, Ohio State defensive end Jack Sawyer strip-sacked Ewers and ran back for the game-winning 83-yard score.
Asked about the unlucky pitch after the game, Herbstreit, who called the game on ESPN, said the Longhorns should consider using Arch Manning in short-yardage situations like they did early in the game. He pointed out that it was.
“I'm not going to take any head coach's word with a grain of salt, especially a player like this: [Sarkisian]are very passionate about that,” Herbstreit said. “But I thought you might see some wrinkles.” [of] Arch comes into play with his running ability in that situation. Maybe they'll read the zone and corner him. Again, I'm not going to take him at face value, but a wide-spread attack with an Ohio State defense led by Caleb Downs, as fast-flowing as they lead, is hard to go by. It was. They tried to find them napping, but could not understand. ”
Sarkisian stood by his decision after the game.
“When we got to the end goal, we went for the heavy package, and that's Jerick's package,” Sarkisian said. “We ran and obviously there was no movement at all, and our plan was to try and get the ball on the edge when we got down there, and they went to the big guys. I'm not completely sure, but it was on the other side of where it was leaking. [the pitch is] On one of those plays, if you block it well, you can get to the end zone, and we didn't, so we lost a lot of yards. ”
Sarkisian said the play left Texas “feeling like we were stuck behind the eight ball, because we knew from the score of the game that we were in fourth-down territory.”
“It was okay even if we didn't score. It's not that we didn't want to score, but we were thinking, 'Okay, they're going to have to support us and they'll probably score,'” the coach said. added. Good field position allows for more possession. I can't imagine a sack, and it would bounce back to that guy and he would run for a touchdown. ”
Manning, who is the nephew of Eli and Peyton and is expected to be the starting quarterback for the Texans next year if Ewers enters the NFL Draft, made a key play in the second quarter that extended the drive, and the Longhorns' This led to his first goal.
After going scoreless for most of the first half, Texas finally scored on a fourth-down play from Manning's quarterback keeper with 29 seconds left in the second quarter.
With the ball at midfield and 1 yard gained for another set of downs, Manning replaces Ewers and takes the scheduled quarterback keeper to the far side of the field for an 8-yard and Got a new set down.
Ewers then re-entered and completed two of his next three passes, the latter an 18-yard touchdown to Jadon Blue, tying the game at 7-7.
We'll never know what would have happened if Sarkisian had called Manning's number in the fourth quarter.
