MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – West Virginia coach Neal Brown made no quips about the offense his team will face Saturday when Texas comes to Morgantown.
“I think they’re really good,” he said. “I think they’re the best offense we’ve played.”
The No. 11 Longhorns (3-1, 1-0) may not have the most explosive offense like their Red River rival Oklahoma, but Texas is at its best being efficient, which comes down to quarterback Sam Ehlinger. In almost two full seasons of being a starter, Ehlinger has thrown only 13 interceptions to 51 touchdowns. If you eliminate his freshman year when his touchdown/interception ratio was 11/7, he’s thrown 40 touchdowns to just six interceptions.
Ehlinger has also been lethal with his legs, but with the success Texas has had across the board, he hasn’t need to run as often.
“I think he’s special,” Brown said of Ehlinger. “He’s a tough kid and I think he has improved his passing ability. He has been extremely accurate thus far. He’s a tough tackle — he’s a dual-threat guy and they use him in the run game as well. He’s really tough to get down. I think his personality is what that team has taken. He’s a tough guy and he’s a winner. Obviously, you can tell by watching him he loves everything that Texas represents.”
The Longhorns are also No. 2 nationally in third-down conversion efficiency at 57%, so they are able to sustain long drives and are difficult to get off the field.
And with that efficiency in the short-yardage game comes chunk plays, which Texas has done a much better job this season than the previous two years under coach Tom Herman.
Three Texas receivers have four touchdown grabs — Devin Duvernay, Jake Smith and Brennan Eagles. Smith and Eagles have only combined for 23 catches but have been a red zone threats with eight scores.
This doesn’t include Collin Johnson, who is arguably the best receiver of the group, but he is hampered by a hamstring injury. Herman said Monday that Johnson would try to practice this week after missing the last two games, but his status for Saturday’s game remains uncertain.
Duvernay emerged as a star with Texas this year — currently leading the nation in receptions, with 39, and is eighth nationally in yards after the catch, with 261. Ehlinger targeted Duvernay 40 times within five yards of the line of scrimmage, so Duvernay is a big part of the Longhorns’ efficiency early on.
Duvernay “is a guy that has been in the program for a while, so when you watch him — he’s really heady,” Brown said. “They move him around to a bunch of different spots, and I think he’s got a real good feel for just football in general. If we weren’t playing this week, I’d just like to watch him play because he does a really good job of settling zones. He understands when it’s man and runs away from man coverage. He catches the ball, and just like I was talking about our guys needing to, he catches and gets vertical. He has the ability to make a guy miss, and they’ve done a great job of getting the ball, too, especially when they had some other guys out.”
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