Texas Football: 4 takeaways from Horns heart-pumping OT win vs. K-State

Maalik Murphy’s highs and lows

This was a massive game for redshirt freshman quarterback Maalik Murphy in his second start for the Longhorns. Texas needed an efficient game out of Murphy where he would take good care of the football and effectively spread the ball around to the multitude of skill weapons around him on offense.

Murphy was able to do that and a little bit more with a hot start to the first quarter. He connected with junior wide receiver Adonai Mitchell for multiple 40+ yard deep ball completions. One of the deep balls from Murphy to Mitchell went for a 40+ yard touchdown pass that was the first score of the game for the Longhorns.

Murphy finished up the first quarter with an insane stat line, with over 150 passing yards, seven completions, and one passing touchdown. Murphy’s 152 passing yards in the first quarter is the second-most by any Big 12 quarterback in conference play this season.

But that was about it for the positives for Murphy in the first 45 minutes of this game. Murphy went cold in the second and third quarters, including a bad interception when Texas could ill afford to turn the ball over early in the fourth quarter.

Murphy wasn’t able to get much else going in this game, which led to the Longhorns having to mostly rely on the ground game. And that wasn’t working much either, as Texas mustered just 31 rushing yards and roughly 2.5 yards per carry in the fourth quarter and overtime.