Texas Football: How Longhorns transfers fared in Week 1 vs. UTEP

Three skill position players that Texas football got out of the NCAA Transfer Portal were able to make various impacts in the opener vs. UTEP.

The season opener likely went a lot better than planned for head coach Tom Herman and the Texas football program after a very tumultuous offseason in the midst of the novel coronavirus pandemic and all of the social activism going on around the globe. After an offseason that seemed like it could never end (literally at one point when it looked like the college football season might not happen), Texas got the 2020 season underway in dramatic fashion in a huge win last weekend.

Texas took on the UTEP Miners out of Conference-USA at home at Darrell K. Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium under the lights on Sep. 12, and came away with a dominant victory by the final score of 59-3. The Longhorns held a whopping 45-3 lead just at halftime. Senior star quarterback Sam Ehlinger had a record-breaking first half, in which he managed more than 400 passing yards, five passing touchdowns, and no turnovers.

In fact, the Longhorns scored on the first offensive play of the game on an explosive 78-yard touchdown pass from Ehlinger to redshirt sophomore wide receiver Joshua Moore.

That 56-point win over Texas over UTEP gave them exactly what they needed to pick up a good amount of momentum heading into the bye week, then the beginning of the Big 12 slate. Texas opens up Big 12 play on Sep. 26, on the road in Lubbock against the Texas Tech Red Raiders.

There’s a lot of good things that the Longhorns can note heading into the bye week, and then hitting the road to face Texas Tech. One of those was a solid first week showing from a couple of players they got out of the NCAA Transfer Portal during the offseason.

Here’s a look at how the transfers did for the Longhorns in Week 1.