2025 Texas Football is broken mess after bad loss to Florida
If you had to bet your house on whether the Texas Longhorns will finish the season with a winning record, would you? Can the team that laid one of the worst eggs in recent UT memory even win a single game the rest of the way? After the Longhorns 29-21 loss to the Florida Gators Saturday, things look very dire.
It shows how mediocre the now 2-3 Gators are that Texas even had a chance to tie the game on the final drive. Not since the disastrous Arkansas game in 2021 has a Steve Sarkisian Texas team looked this bad. Bad on offense. Bad on defense. Bad on special teams. It's hard to win games if you only have four or five good plays in a game.
Let's start with the defense. That side of the ball has been the savior of the team most of the year. There's a chance when the year is in the books, the defense that played Ohio State the toughest was Texas. But you wouldn't know that after Saturday.
Starting on the opening series, a 13 play, 84 yard touchdown drive, the Longhorns defense had trouble getting Gators quarterback DJ Lagway and the UF offense off the field. Lagway went 21 of 28 for 298 yards with two touchdowns and an interception. While not awe inspiring, he was by far the better QB on the day and looked more like the QB that was a preseason Heisman Trophy hopeful.
The Texas defense gave up three drives of 10+ plays and 457 yards of total offense. Not what you want from the side of the ball that's supposed to be one of the best in the nation.
Special teams was a mess too. Texas actually had a punt blocked. The block happened in the second quarter and resulted in a Florida safety. The Horns also had two touchbacks that should have been downed around the Gators one yard line.
But it is the Texas offense that is painful to watch. The offensive line is atrocious. We all know offensive line coach Kyle Flood is a legendary position coach. But whatever he's teaching to this group isn't sinking in. Texas QB Arch Manning was sacked six times, and while a couple might be his fault, the line HAS to do better.
Manning has the yips. He has happy feet. He's having trouble doing the basics a third strong quarterback should do. He's not reading defenses. He's scrambling like a spaz at the first sign of trouble. He's overthrowing wide open receivers deep and under-throwing wide open guys short.
His brain looks like a scrambled mess and he's starting to get that thousand yard stare on the sidelines. The look of befuddlement. I'm not suggesting Sark bench Arch, but something has to change or this gem, this all world recruit is going to get ruined mentally. If he's not already.
Ultimately, it all falls on the coaching staff. They recruited a team filled with four and five-stars. They have a reputation of coaching guys up. Look at all the recent draft picks. But they are letting this team down. Or vice versa. Either way, there needs to be changes either in personnel or in preparation or in messaging. Because, whatever the coaching staff is doing now isn't working.
To think this team started the year the preseason No. 1 in the nation! Remember making fun of the Aggies baseball team for the same thing? Texas fans are going hear it from everywhere this week.
Is the season done? It's hard to say, but the memory of the Longhorns trip to the Swamp will haunt the team and the fans for a long time.
But hey, beat the Oklahoma Sooners next week at the Cotton Bowl Stadium in the Red River Shootout and all is well again. For at least a week anyway.
This article originally appeared on Longhorns Wire: 2025 Texas Football season on verge of disaster after Florida loss