3 takeaways from Texas football’s crippling collapse vs. OK State

Bijan Robinson and Roschon Johnson won’t always be able to save this team

Just as I didn’t think that junior quarterback Hudson Card was to fully blame for the loss to the Texas Tech Red Raiders on the road on Sep. 24, I don’t believe that all the blame belongs to Ewers this week.

Yet, I do think Ewers is more at fault in this loss to Oklahoma State than Card was against Texas Tech. There were multiple opportunities that Texas had to seal this game down the stretch in the second half. But Ewers was never able to find his rhythm and actually get the Texas offense moving down the field.

Moreover, Texas relied heavily in the first half on the standout running back duo of junior Bijan Robinson and senior Roschon Johnson. And that worked for a while with Bijan going for two explosive touchdowns, one on the ground and one through the air.

Meanwhile, Roschon exploded through the hole in the second quarter for a 52-yard touchdown run that was probably the best play of the game for the Longhorns.

But Texas wasn’t able to capitalize on what the duo of Roschon and Bijan gave this team in the first half. Texas tried to run the ball with Bijan up the middle in the second half to put this game away, but that was pretty predictable for the Oklahoma State defense at that point.

Texas needs to find a way to get the offense in a rhythm in the second half when holding a double-digit lead.

The very fact that Texas only had one first down in the third quarter and 2.4 yards per play after putting up more than a dozen first downs and roughly eight yards per play in the first half shows the struggles this offense ran into in the second half.

This was a shame, though, as Bijan and Roschon did a nice job of putting this team in a position to win down the stretch. Texas’ passing game needs to be able to add balance to the offense to prevent teams from loading up the box in the second half, which is what we often saw down the stretch against Sark last season.