By Steve Habel, Senior Contributing Writer
AMES, Iowa — For those who believe in the law of averages, the Texas Longhorns’ last-second 23-21 loss to Iowa State on Connor Assalley’s 36-yard field goal on the game’s final snap was well past due … as a loss for the Longhorns and a win for the Cyclones.
But that is little solace to the Longhorns, who walked off the chilly field at Jack Trice Stadium in Ames, Iowa to the reality that there now is no chance to play for the Big 12 championship. That they let a winnable game, and a crucial one at that, get away from them in the final minutes.
Texas [s2If current_user_can(access_s2member_level2)]had two crucial penalties on the final Iowa State drive, a 15-yard pass interference call on Caden Sterns that pushed the Cyclones into field goal range and a 5-yard offside flag on Joseph Ossai on fourth down that moved Iowa State even closer and allowed it to take every second off the clock.
Texas coach Tom Herman called the penalties on Iowa State’s go-ahead drive “as backbreaking as it gets.”
“I’d never say we got outcoached,” Herman added. “We continued to make adjustments. They had a couple wrinkles that we adjusted to, and I felt like we were putting our guys in a good position.”
Brock Purdy passed for 354 yards and two touchdowns and engineered the game-winning nine-play, 63-yard drive over the final three minutes to lead the Cyclones (6-4 overall, 4-3 in Big 12 play) to the win.
It was Iowa State’s first walk-off field goal since 1983. The Cyclones’ four losses coming into Saturday’s game with Texas were by a combined 11 points.
Conversely, Texas has won twice this season on last-second field goals by Cameron Dicker. This time, the script was flipped.
Deshaunte Jones caught seven passes for 144 yards and a score while La’Micheal Pettway had eight grabs for 100 yards in for the Cyclones. Breece Hall ran for 101 yards on 24 carries for Iowa State.
Sam Ehlinger threw for 273 yards and three touchdowns for Texas (6-4 overall, 4-3 in Big 12 play) with Devin Duvernay hauling in nine catches for 107 yards.
“We just stopped ourselves,” Ehlinger said. “We had opportunities to make plays and we didn’t. It’s hard to win a football game when you don’t make plays.”
The Cyclones wasted no time establishing its offense, driving 59 yards in eight plays to a 2-yard tocuhdown pass from Purdy to tight end Charlie Tolar for a 7-0 lead on its opening possession.
From then until the final minute of the first half, the defenses dominated. Iowa State extended its lead to 10-0 with a Assalley field goal with 47 seconds to play in the half after a 15-play, 67-yard drive.
Texas finally responded with a 14-yard touchdown pass from Ehlinger to Brennan Eagles. On that scoring drive, which took just three plays and 30 seconds, the Longhorns amassed 75 of their 134 yards of offense in the first half.
“Really, really poor performance by our offense for the first few quarters,” Herman said. “We’ve got to really examine our game plan in the run game and our execution. To not be able to run the ball the way that we thought we would be able to, that was the biggest difference.”
The Longhorns ended up with just 54 yards rushing, the worst performance of the season, with 27 of those by Ehlinger.
On the first play of the third quarter, Purdy rolled away from the Texas defensive pressure and threw deep down the middle to a wide open Deshaunte Jones for a 75-yard touchdown and a 17-7 lead.
The Cyclones went up, 20-7, on Brayden Narveson’s 48-yard field goal at the 12:09 mark of the third quarter.
Texas showed some life with a 80-yard, 17-play drive that bridged the end of the third quarter and the start of the fourth and culminated in a 22-yard touchdown pass from Ehlinger to Keaontay Ingram that cut the Iowa State lead to 20-14.
The Longhorns eschewed a short field goal with just under six minutes to play in favor of going for the touchdown on fourth-down and goal from the Iowa State 7-yard line. Ehlinger roamed left, then right in the pocket before drilling a touchdown pass to Malcolm Epps, and Dicker’s extra point gave Texas the lead for the first time at 21-20.
It wouldn’t last, thanks to clutch execution by the Cyclones down the stretch and mistakes by the Longhorns that good teams just aren’t supposed to make.
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