It's been quite a while since Texas fielded a football team as frustrating as this one, especially from an offensive standpoint. There seems to be no rhyme, reason, or sequencing to Steve Sarkisian's playcalling thus far in the season, and it's beginning to take a toll on everyone involved.
One of the biggest problems that consistently hinders the offense is the complete lack of identity each week. The offense doesn't have a "go-to" set of plays or scheme that it relies on to get easy yards. The offense is never put in a position to be successful.
Sark will call a weird pattern of plays to try and outsmart the defense but it almost never works.
The team should be focusing on the ground game right now with how much talent they have in the backfield in C.J. Baxter, Tre Wisner, and Christian Clark. Yes, the offensive line has been incredibly underwhelming in general but they've at least been "okay" in the power run game. When D.J. Campbell and Nick Brooks have been able to trap and pull out in front of the ball-carriers, the ground game looks smoother than it usually does. The offensive line just can't hold up consistently in 1-on-1 zone matchups right now.
The run game should be the engine, and the passing game should be the complimentary piece between the 20's but it's currently the opposite. Though Arch Manning actually looked pretty good tonight overall, the play calling is what continues to stall the offense. For example, stretching the defense out horizontally with sweeps, swing passes, and misdirection absolutely gashed Mississippi State's offense in the 1st quarter. Why would you go away from what's working?
It's one thing if Sark began to sequence plays off of that, like using jet or orbit motion and perimeter misdirection on inside zone or power plays to influence the 2nd level of defense, but that's not even happening.
In addition to another embarrassing offensive performance, Texas' defense just gave up 38 points to a Mississippi State team who struggled to put up 34 points against Southern Mississippi earlier in the year. The secondary undoubtedly missed Michael Taaffe in week 9, and hopefully they'll look more coordinated next week.