FIVE QUESTIONS: IOWA STATE 7 – TEXAS 33

EACH YEAR, the Longhorns honor Veterans Day with a poignant and respectful salute. On game day, the team pays tribute to those who served our country over the years. But on Nov. 10, the game took on an even more meaningful tone due to the death of former Texas coach Darrell K Royal. Royal — who recently made his battle with dementia public — passed away just three days earlier.

The team walked onto the field, knowing that they still had football to play and that the show Royal helped build must go on. And with all the pageantry and tears, the Texas football team honored Royal the best way possible — they played a nearly flawless game, beating Iowa State 33-7. Someone needed to act as the foil …

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for the Longhorns’ day of tribute, and the well coached Cyclones played the role perfectly. Iowa State is a team that people can neither trivialize nor discard. They are the type of opponent that could draw Texas’ focus back to the game and their season goals.

The 19th-ranked Longhorns took apart Iowa State. Texas played an offensive football game chock full of power with a dash of finesse. The Longhorn defense dominated the second half and appeared to be maturing into the unit many expected them to be at the start of the season.  “This is the team we want to be — it’s starting to show signs of what we want,” head coach Mack Brown said. “Defensively we saw nothing between Ole Miss and Baylor. People don’t forget the first half of the season, and we can’t go back and rehash what happened in those two games we lost.” Texas (8-2 overall and 5-2 in Big 12 play) racked up 606 yards of total offense with an attack balanced between the run (222 yards in 45 carries) and the pass (387 yards).

Seven different players carried the ball for the Longhorns, including five who had runs in a single third-quarter drive. “If you’re going to be a physical offense and talk about running the ball, you’ve got to run it against a good defense,” Brown said. “Iowa State has a good run defense. I was proud of those 222 hard-fought yards.” Quarterback David Ash passed for a career high 364 yards, two touchdowns and hit on 25-of-31 throws, including his first 11. Amazingly enough, Ash could’ve improved those statistics. Two of his incompletions came when he slightly under threw wide-open receivers on plays that should’ve resulted in touchdowns. Both intended targets — Marquise Goodwin and Daje Johnson — had their hands on the ball. “We talk about consistency and doing  our job on a consistent basis,” Ash said. “All the guys on the field are doing that. It’s that simple.”

Texas spread the wealth across the receivers, with 10 different players catching passes in the game. “It’s the second year of this offense, and I like that we’re getting the ball in the hands of our playmakers,” Brown said. “We’re getting on the same page. The Longhorns drove 73 yards in six plays, leading to a Johnathan Gray 5-yard touchdown on their second possession.

From there, Texas never looked back. Later in the first quarter, Ash hit wide receiver Mike Davis on a picture-perfect 61-yard bomb. Texas expanded its lead to 20-0 on a 3-yard Ash scoring pass to tight end Barrett Mathews with 2:53 to play in the first half. Iowa State dented the Longhorns with a quick scoring drive and a 14-yard touchdown pass from Steele Jantz to Quenton Bundrage to end the half.

The score drew the ire of Brown and his fellow coaches at halftime, and the defense responded by producing perhaps its best half of the 2012 season. The Cyclones (5-5 overall, 2-5 in Big 12) managed just 64 yards of offense in the second half, making only three first downs. Iowa State snapped the ball five times or less per their five possessions during the second half. The 277 yards of total offense for Iowa State was the third-lowest output by an opponent this season, and the third time the Longhorns limited the opposition to less than 300 yards. “We’re improving and that’s good, especially late in season,” Texas safety Kenny Vaccaro said. “We have a little sign [in the locker room] that says, “Remember November.” Everybody will stop talking about the first half of the season if we do our jobs.”

The Longhorns kept their foot to the proverbial pedal throughout, adding 37- and 25-yard field goals by Nick Jordan and another Gray touchdown run — a 13-yard scamper that took away any chance of an Iowa State comeback. “Texas is a hot football team,” Iowa State coach Paul Rhoads said. “They’ve now won four in a row, and when you play a team like that you can’t make mistakes. We just didn’t do enough things right to give ourselves a chance to win.”

Texas seems to have found its stride in the final quarter of the season. Now, with another angel watching from above, the singing of “The Eyes of Texas” never seemed more appropriate.

1) HOW DID THE LONGHORNS HONOR ROYAL? 

The initials “DKR” appeared on the team’s helmets – in the middle of the Longhorn logo – as well as on the Longhorn silhouette that stretches across the middle of the playing field. The additions will remain through the rest of the 2012 campaign.

The most interesting tip of the hat to Royal occurred when the Texas offense lined up and ran its opening play out of the wishbone formation. Royal and former assistant Emory Ballard introduced the wishbone formation in 1968.  Everyone knew the Longhorns planned to use the formation; Brown told the nation the day Royal passed.

Both ESPN and ABC cut away from other games to show Texas’ first snap in honor of the former coach. But what took people by surprise was what Texas did out of the formation. “We put ourselves in a bind when I told the coaches I wanted to dedicate the first play to Royal with the wishbone. The coaches said, ‘It’s Wednesday, and we don’t have [a play that uses the wishbone].’

So these crazy young coaches come back to me with a double-reverse pass. And I said, ‘You’re kidding. That would make [Royal] madder than anything if we do that.’” Royal once said, “When you throw a pass, three things can happen, and two of them are bad.” Texas went ahead with the trick play. Ash handed off to Jaxon Shipley. Shipley — who was in the backfield — threw back to Ash who hit Greg Daniels for 47 yards.

“I figured if you throw it twice, that means two good things can happen,” Brown said. “That was the only way I could figure out how to make it work. Bless his heart. We miss him. I thought it was a fitting way to honor him.”

2) HAS ASH MOVED ON FROM THE KANSAS GAME?

When the media asked Ash about sitting on the bench during the final quarter against Kansas and if the game continued to affect him, the sophomore shook his head and said – mostly under his breath – that he couldn’t believe his performance was still an issue. “I’m trying to do my job for the team the best I can, and hold my guys accountable for their jobs,” he added. “All of us are getting better. Whenever someone gets better, it helps me do my job. And that’s the focus, to get better every week.”

Brown called Ash’s struggle against Kansas an opportunity to deal with adversity. “David’s getting comfortable with everybody,” Brown said. “He’s leading better. He was more focused during the past two weeks since Kansas. He said that he wasn’t able to over- come adversity, but that’s part of growing up. He needs to be ready for things not working well and still be able to handle them.”

Ash has been on the top of his game the past two weeks, rolling the Longhorns to wins against Texas Tech and Iowa State. He’s gone 36-for-50 passing for 626 yards and five touchdowns since his misstep in Lawrence. During that stretch, he didn’t throw a single interception and the team didn’t record any turnovers.

3) WHAT WAS TEXAS’ KEY DEFENSIVE STATISTIC? 

Iowa State was 3-of-12 in third-down conversions, including 0-for-4 in the second half. Texas converted eight of its 14 third-down attempts. “The game was about third downs,” Texas defensive coordinator Manny Diaz said. “Iowa State couldn’t get us off the field, and they couldn’t stay on the field when it go to third down. If we can do a great job and just win first and second downs, we can get the third-down defense on the field.”  “And it’s a sight to behold to watch David [Ash] and our offense execute those third-down conversions,” Diaz added.

“It’s difficult to play defense when teams are able to drive on you.” Sophomore linebacker Steve Edmond, who had six tackles and a sack against Iowa State, said the defense is improving because they’re gaining confidence. “[The defense] makes sense now,” he said.

“At first we didn’t understand what gap to go to, but now we do. We’re confident about what we’re doing. We’re communicating better, and when you communicate better, you play better. Now when we call a blitz, we all run our blitz harder than we used to. I used to blitz and be reading instead of just going. Now I’m just blitzing and going.”

4) WAS THIS TEXAS’ MOST DIVERSE OFFENSIVE GAME? 

Co-offensive coordinator Bryan Harsin threw a little of everything at Iowa State. With seven runners, 10 receivers and two quarterbacks getting into the action, the Texas locker room had to be a happy place after the game. “We used quite a bit today, I will say that,” Harsin said. “We ran a lot of things that we’ve been practicing and haven’t gotten an opportunity to do. Those things need to marinate as the season goes on. We still have some things at our disposal, and we will come up with more.”

Shipley, who caught eight passes for 137 yards for his third career 100-yard receiving game (and first of the season), said Harsin is liable to call anything at any time. “That’s what makes this offense so much fun,” Shipley said. “I swear coach Harsin sits in his office and thinks up plays, and then bounces them off us to see if we think they’ll work. It’s like he’s drawing stuff up in the sand, and that’s what we did when we were kids and falling in love with football.”

5) WHAT DOES THE FUTURE HOLD FOR TEXAS? 

For the first time in three seasons, the Longhorns will end the year with a winning record in the Big 12. Their conference record also translates into the team capturing the most regular season wins since 2009. “You’ve got to finish seasons well,” Brown said. “It gives you momentum going into the bowl season, into new spring and into the next year. But you just never know. You’re dealing with human beings here, not with video games. Anytime you get a win, you need to mark it up in that left column and keep going forward.”

Texas has come far since their loss in the Cotton Bowl against Oklahoma. With three games left on their schedule — including the Thanksgiving game against TCU and a road game in Manhattan against undefeated Kansas State — Texas is on the upswing, and could play in an upper-tier bowl game if they can beat either the Horned Frogs or the Wildcats. A strong finish to 2012 is in the cards for the Longhorns — a scenario that would bring a smile to Royal’s face.

 

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