The Texas Longhorns now have a major problem at quarterback. His last name is Manning | Opinion

Had it all gone according to script, Quinn Ewers plays one more game at the University of Texas and shortly thereafter announces his intentions to declare for the NFL Draft.

This has been the plan since Ewers was at Carroll high school, but a Manning was never a part of this scenario. As is often the case with most scripts, expect a re-write.

The quarterback room at the University of Texas is now the most interesting story in all of college football.

Texas lost, 37-31, to Washington on Monday in the Sugar Bowl in the national semifinals, and while the Longhorns had their chances the difference in the game was the quarterback. Ewers played a decent game, and Heisman Trophy runner up Michael Penix played like an NFL quarterback.

It’s hard to envision a scenario where Quinn Ewers is the starting quarterback at Texas in 2024. And he’s not a bad college quarterback.

Ewers spent one season at Ohio State before transferring to Texas, where he has played the last two. Declaring for the NFL Draft now would be a needless risk.

Also a risk, returning to Texas for an additional season when quarterback royalty is QB2. Arch Manning didn’t sign with Texas to watch football.

At a minimum Texas coach Steve Sarkisian did not make the same mistake as former Texas coach Mack Brown did; do not let the presence of one good quarterback on your roster prevent you from recruiting another and then another.

Keep them coming, and let them figure it out and transfer if need.

Ewers didn’t stick around at Ohio State, for whatever reason. Maybe he was homesick. Maybe he didn’t like the quarterback situation.

In Ewers’ two seasons in Austin, he has been injured, and improved. He led Texas to a win at Alabama earlier this season, the highest high point this program has enjoyed in a decade.

He also led Texas to the Big 12 championship, and this spot in the playoff. These are not nothing achievements.

In the playoff game against Washington, he completed 24 of 43 passes for 318 yards with a touchdown and no interceptions.

That’s a lot of incomplete passes; the last one was the killer. A better ball intended for Texas receiver Adonai Mitchell in the end zone is a likely touchdown on the game’s final play.

Mitchell had 1 on 1 coverage, and the pass from the Washington 13-yard line into the end zone needed to be thrown to the pylon, where Mitchell would have had position to make the catch.

Instead, Ewers put too much air under the ball, which allowed the Washington defensive back to cleanly knock the pass away.

It wasn’t a bad pass; a better pass was needed in that moment. It didn’t help that Ewers had a defensive lineman a step or two away, and his presence likely affected the throw.

That Texas was in this position was only because of the injury sustained to Washington running back Dillon Johnson with under a minute remaining; it prevented the Huskies from draining the clock to 15 seconds before punting it away.

Texas fans will “If” and “But” and “The refs screwed us” about this game for the next several months, but Washington was the better team and deserved to win the game. Texas’ season is over and it’s decision time.

“I’m a human being, and I understand what’s ahead,” Ewers said in the press conference after the Sugar Bowl. “But at the same time, there’s a long ways in between here and a year from now. A lot can happen in 365 days. But I know that we’re going to work as hard as we can to try to be back. And that’s all we can really do, is attack the offseason the right way and just continue to build this team to what it’s capable of being.”

That sounds like a man who intends to return to Austin.

Arch Manning did not sign with Texas to do anything other than play, and start. Serving as a backup in Austin for a year was always a part of this process.

He’s done that, and served as the No. 3 quarterback behind Ewers and Maalik Murphy; Murphy played well this season when Ewers was out with an injury.

Murphy recently announced he is transferring to Duke, which doesn’t impact this Texas QB situation much.

Texas will soon join the SEC; its second game of the 2024 season will be against Michigan, in Ann Arbor. Also on the schedule, Georgia, Oklahoma, and Texas A&M.

Under most scenarios, Texas moving forward against that schedule with a Quinn Ewers as its starting quarterback would be fine. He played well enough for Texas to reach the playoffs, and nearly win the game.

This is not most scenarios. Quarterback royalty is the current QB2, and Arch Manning will want to play.

Quinn Ewers had a script. So does Arch Manning.

Sarkisian will handle this re-write, and it’s hard to see a scenario where Manning is anything other than QB1.