Texas Football: 3 standouts from first fall practice of the week

Arch Manning, QB

Arch was the Longhorn player we heard the most about coming out of the first day of Week 3 fall practice. The No. 1 ranked high school recruit in the nation in the 2023 class continues to impress after standing out with some nice plays in last weekend’s fall scrimmage.

The biggest play Arch made in Tuesday evening’s fall practice in team drills was a beautiful deep throw to redshirt junior wide receiver Isaiah Neyor that went for a score. Manning reportedly had to climb the pocket and throw in the face of simulated pressure to get the ball to Neyor downfield.

Right after that deep connection to Neyor, Arch reportedly threw another touchdown on an RPO play to Whittington. IT reported that the “timing, footwork, mechanics, etc.” were “impeccable” on both those throws from Arch.

These two nice throws from Arch come after he made a nice play for a score in last weekend’s scrimmage. Arch went for roughly a 70-yard touchdown in one of the highlighting plays of the scrimmage.

Arch is starting to put it together more consistently in team drills and scrimmage settings in the first half of fall camp compared to what we saw from him during spring ball. He is challenging redshirt freshman quarterback Maalik Murphy for the backup job behind redshirt sophomore starter Quinn Ewers coming out of fall camp.

As of late, Arch and Murphy have rotated the second and third-team quarterback reps in camp.