No. No. 5 Texas avoided a second straight loss with a 27-24 win over No. 25 Vanderbilt.
The Longhorns took a 10-point lead immediately after the two-minute warning on a short Bert Auburn field goal. Vanderbilt scored a TD with 46 seconds left within three seconds, but the onside kick didn’t bother the Longhorns and Texas ended the game with two kneel-downs.
Texas QB Quinn Ewers played in the first half as he went 19 of 21 passing and threw three touchdowns. Two of those came to DeAndre Moore Jr. and both were over 20 meters long.
Ewers finished the game 27 of 37 passing for 288 yards and three scores, although he threw two interceptions on tipped passes.
“I thought he showed great composure and I really thought he played well,” Texas coach Steve Sarkisian said after the game on SEC Network. “Sometimes you have no control over being tipped into the air at the right place at the right time for them. In the end I thought he played very well. He was efficient and got the ball to our playmakers when we needed him.”
Ewers’ appearance came a week after he was benched for Arch Manning on two first-half possessions in the Longhorns’ 30-15 home loss to Georgia. Like Ewers, Manning struggled in his time on the field and Ewers played the entire second half.
There wasn’t any QB controversy during the week, as Sarkisian made it clear after the game that Ewers was still the team’s No. 1 QB.
Vanderbilt played in the AP Top 25 for the first time since 2013 and already had a home win over Alabama this season. The Commodores had a chance to tie the game in the fourth quarter, but Diego Pavia’s fourth-down pass with 5:13 to go was intercepted by Liona Lefau. That pick set up Texas’ field goal just over three minutes later, putting the game out of reach.
The Longhorns are off in Week 10 before hosting Florida on Nov. 9. Vanderbilt heads to Auburn next week where Pavia will have a chance for back-to-back wins over the Tigers. A season ago, Pavia led New Mexico State to a 31-10 win at Auburn.
