Arch Manning better fasten his seat bealt, because his legacy will take shape in the SEC’s fast lane.
Arch Manning and DJ Lagway look overrated. Billy Napier looks underwater.
Playoff awaits Texas if Arch Manning ignites.
Seat belts on, everyone, because San Jose State is in the rearview mirror, and Texas and Arch Manning must shift into the fast lane, where you either drive 90 mph, or you get run off the road.
“Everybody better buckle up,” coach Steve Sarkisian said of the team’s stretch of eight consecutive SEC games.
That’s right, no more Texas-El Paso and Sam Houston State. Texas’ journey to the College Football Playoff either begins this weekend in The Swamp — or it swerves into the ditch.
A month from now, nobody will be talking about how Arch Manning looked against UTEP, because, really, who cares? He played poorly, the bloom fell off the rose, but Texas won.
A week later, Manning taunted winless Sam Houston. Try that in the SEC, and he’ll need a stretcher.
Manning will begin writing his Texas legacy against Florida. You’re remembered by how you perform in high-stakes conference games, not what you do in glorified exhibitions against Conference USA opponents.
Texas enjoyed an open date before the curtain lifts on its SEC schedule. If Manning looks the same in Act II as he did in Act I, the Longhorns’ playoff hopes are going to go poof.
Sarkisian acknowledged Manning’s September “growing pains,” as he played in the fishbowl of unrelenting media spotlight. Manning looked jittery in a season-opening loss to the Buckeyes, and his mechanics were out of whack throughout the first few games.
Will he return from the open date looking more settled in, or is this simply the case of an overrated quarterback, whose recruiting profile was inflated because of his surname?
“He can get back to being the player that he wants to be,” Sarkisian said.
Texas needs that to happen. Its defense looks the part of a playoff team. Its offense, well, not really.
The Longhorns will play four games in a row this month away from Austin, including the annual rivalry clash with Oklahoma in Dallas.
Four ranked opponents remain on the schedule.
The Longhorns can afford one more loss and make the playoff with relative ease. Nobody’s going to penalize them too harshly for losing at Ohio State in the season opener. With two more losses, Texas would be left on the bubble, hoping to become the first three-loss team in playoff history. Three more losses, and forget about it.
If Texas endured some glitches in the season’s first month, then Florida encountered a total system meltdown, complete with a costly loogie, an offense that stubbornly won’t ignite and its own quarterback who’s struggling.
DJ Lagway can compare notes with Manning on what it’s like to be overhyped.
Last call for Florida coach Billy Napier
It’s nearly closing time on Gators coach Billy Napier, while he sits on a scalding stool at the last chance tavern. He’s Florida’s worst coach since World War II, but he vowed earlier this season that his Gators are “close to being pretty dangerous.” Days later, Florida lost again.
Napier has perfectly positioned himself to join a long list of fired coaches who came close to winning more games. He stubbornly retained play-calling duties throughout his tenure, and that’s been good for a grand total of 33 points throughout Florida’s three consecutive losses.
By retaining Napier and not firing him a year ago, Florida knew it could hold onto Lagway. The Gators would have been better off changing coaches and taking their chances with a transfer quarterback, brought in by a new coach.
This game offers a get-right opportunity for Lagway and Manning, a test of which quarterback will return from the open date playing better.
Arch Manning’s Texas legacy begins to take shape against Florida
For Manning, his modest performance in September might strangely help in the long run, because it dimmed the spotlight on him. Nobody’s talking about Manning being the Heisman Trophy front-runner anymore. Nobody’s comparing him to Tim Tebow.
The most anyone should expect from Manning at this point would be for him to improve as the season progresses, to the extent that he helps Texas earn a playoff bid. Perhaps, that would have been a more appropriate expectation of Manning all along.
Sarkisian, himself a former quarterback who played at Brigham Young, knows he can’t compare his college experience to what Manning has encountered.
“The two biggest things that happened to me (as BYU’s quarterback) were USA TODAY wrote an article about me, and I was on the cover of TV Guide,” Sarkisian said.
“Times have changed a little bit for what Arch is going through, comparatively.”
Here’s what hasn’t changed: Quarterbacks are remembered much more for how they play against teams like Florida and Oklahoma than for their stat lines against UTEP.
So, fasten that seat belt, Arch, and put on the blinker, because it’s time to shift into the fast lane, where legacies take shape.
Blake Toppmeyer is the USA TODAY Network’s senior national college football columnist. Email him at BToppmeyer@gannett.com and follow him on X @btoppmeyer.