Steve Sarkisian had good news and bad news in his Monday morning press conference previewing the Texas Longhorns’ upcoming bout with Mississippi State.
The good: Quarterback Quinn Ewers returned to practice after suffering a non-contact abdominal strain in Week 3 against UTSA. The bad: he’s still questionable for Texas’ SEC opener. The positive spin? Arch Manning has performed well in Ewers’ stead.
“Quinn practice today. I would say if, again, if I had to put a report out, he’d be questionable for Saturday,” Sarkisian said. “But we’ll see how he goes throughout the week and monitor how he responds to tomorrow coming off of today’s practice.”
Manning stepped in for Ewers and immediately scored two touchdowns against the Roadrunners. The momentum followed him into his first career start last weekend against Louisiana-Monroe. Manning completed 15-of-29 pass attempts for 259 yards, two touchdowns and two interceptions against the Warhawks, helping the Longhorns to a victory that kept them atop the AP poll.
“I think one of the challenges is, you know, we’re trying to make sure that when the ball is snapped, that he plays football, because it’s still a game, and you still have to play it,” Sarkisian said of Manning. “I don’t want him to get almost paralysis by analysis, because you can over prepare to some degree too, where you start chasing what I thought was going to happen because this is what I saw.”
As for when Ewers might come back, Sarkisian doesn’t have a clear answer. It all depends on whether he feels Ewers can execute the gameplan effectively.
“I hate to pare it down to that, but that’s really the truth,” Sarkisian said. “That’s why I need to see how he responds to today’s work, and then what it looks like on a Tuesday, then a Wednesday, which are pretty heavy days for him, and then how he rebounds on Thursday, so on and so forth.
“So it’s going to be a work in progress. But today was a good start. I was actually impressed with where he was today, but that’s been his trajectory since the injury happened. I feel like he keeps getting incrementally better day by day.”
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