In the closing seconds of the Longhorns’ Sugar Bowl defeat, coach Steve Sarkisian outlines the strategy.
In the last seconds of Monday night’s College Football Playoff game between the Texas Longhorns and the Washington Huskies at the Sugar Bowl, the Longhorns managed to punch their ticket to the National Championship in spite of the fact that, only moments before, it appeared like all hope was lost.
Even though ESPN’s Analytics gave the Huskies a 99.9 percent probability to win with 1:02 remaining, the Longhorns managed to get themselves in position to win the game at Washington’s 13-yard line after trailing 37-28 with 1:10 remaining.
Nevertheless, a gift-wrapped opportunity was lost by the Longhorns, 37-31, when three straight incomplete passes from quarterback Quinn Ewers in the final ten seconds signaled a disappointing conclusion to the team’s campaign.
At the beginning of the postgame press conference, Longhorns coach Steve Sarkisian and Ewers were both questioned about the play-calling and execution in those crucial final seconds, something that Texas fans will probably be questioning as well.
One of the more puzzling plays came when running back Jaydon Blue was given a swing throw with 15 seconds remaining. Blue went out of bounds on the play, losing a yard, but he also squandered five crucial seconds that could have been used to get Texas back to the 13-yard line. Sarkisian talked extensively about the play and the overall ending scene.
About Blue’s swing pass, Sarkisian remarked, “Yeah, he was more of a check down on the play.” “For JT (Ja’Tavion Sanders) or J Whitt (Jordan Whittington), we were searching for a chance. Our goal is to set up a one-on-one situation where those guys can high-point it. They performed admirably in defense, of course, and Quinn did a terrific job of just getting the ball out to Blue when he had a chance in space but had to go out of bounds.
You’re out of timeouts, so it’s a precarious scenario. Because of this, we must exercise extreme caution to avoid finishing a ball short on the goal line, as doing so will effectively terminate the game. It becomes challenging, particularly when they are defending the endzone, when you have to toss it into the endzone every time. We simply couldn’t quite manage to match up some different route combinations in order to create some one-on-ones and give our play-makers an opportunity to make a play. That’s just how things sometimes work.”
The Longhorns had a chance to win late in the first place because of Ewers, who had a poor start but picked up steam in the second half. As the final second of the game drew near, his attempt to pass to Adonai Mitchell was swatted aside. The intended target on three incompletions in the end zone on the final drive was Mitchell, who had scored a one-yard touchdown earlier in the fourth quarter to keep Texas in the game.
“We’re trying to take a shot at the end zone, obviously if it falls short the game’s gonna be over,” Ewers explained. “I was looking to give my guys an opportunity to go make a play at the end of the day.”
Texas supporters will probably be thinking about the Longhorns’ disappointing season-ending drive, which leaves them wondering what may have been, throughout the offseason.