With usual starter Quinn Ewers out due to an oblique injury, Texas Longhorns quarterback Arch Manning – the nephew of Peyton and Eli Manning — made his first collegiate start on Saturday.
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Fans across the football landscape have been calling for Manning to be QB1 since the beginning of the offseason, so Ewers’ absence has added more fuel to the flames surrounding the program’s short-term outlook.
During the contest, ESPN spoke with former Longhorns signal-caller Colt McCoy, who was inducted into the school’s athletics Hall of Honor at halftime, about the team’s current QB situation
The 11-year NFL veteran didn’t offer an opinion on who he thinks should be the starter if both men are healthy, but he did provide the duo with some advice on handling the expectations that come with their status.
“There’s a lot of pressure playing quarterback at the University of Texas… for them, I would just say ‘you have a wonderful team around you. This team is built to win a championship. So just go out there and execute… and lean on each other… ignore the noise, and play your game.'”
Manning was solid in his first outing, throwing for 258 yards and two touchdowns in a 51-3 victory over Louisiana-Monroe. He also completed just 51.7% of his passes and tossed two interceptions, giving credence to Ewers’ position atop the depth chart.
McCoy didn’t really embrace the Ewers-Manning debate, but he did say he believes the two “have a great relationship.” Earlier in the day, though, another notable college football voice spoke on it, reminiscing on something he experienced late in his career.
Nick Saban on the Ewers-Manning “rivalry”
On ESPN’s College GameDay, the seven-time national champion head coach related what he sees happening in Austin to what he experienced when he had Jalen Hurts and Tua Tagovailoa in his quarterback room at Alabama.
In Saban’s opinion, the Longhorns are only helping themselves by getting Manning as many snaps as possible, especially with the expanded College Football Playoff being instituted this season.
“[Jalen Hurts] was 26-2 as a starter, but we played Tua as much as we could…We knew there was going to be a time when he was going to need to go in the game and win the game… this is exactly what Texas’s situation is… [depth] is going to have a significant impact this year with all the games [they’ve] got to play.”
It remains to be seen if Texas will need Manning to step in and carry them to a championship as Tagovailoa did for Alabama in 2018, but there’s no disputing Saban’s point: the experience Manning gains each week in Ewers’ stead could help the Longhorns win the title for the first time since 2005.
