Longhorns vs. Oklahoma State: Pokes, Penalties, & Poor Passing Plague Texas in Loss

The Texas Longhorns blew a critical lead on the road to the Oklahoma State Cowboys on Saturday.

The No. 20 Texas Longhorns and No. 11 Oklahoma State Cowboys entered Saturday's game in Stillwater for what was fixing to be another classic Big 12 shootout.

The matchup lived up to that expectation in the first half, but it was the Cowboys who emerged victorious in a 41-34 win over the Longhorns.

Let's look at a few takeaways from the loss.

Rocky road for Quinn Ewers

Saturday marked Ewers' first true road game of the season. Sarkisian has praised his ability to be calm and composed ahead of a tough crowd in Stillwater, but Ewers seemed a bit out of sorts compared to what we've seen from him in past weeks.

His start to the game couldn't have gone worse, as he sailed a pass high that was intercepted by the Cowboys.

The Longhorns relied on the running game and short passing game for the rest of the way, as Ewers continued to overthrow his receivers and consistently throwing passes way over everyone's head.

His lack of chemistry with star receiver Xavier Worthy was most noteworthy. Ewers targeted Worthy a whopping 16 times but completed just four of those passes.

Ewers finished with a 38.7 completion percentage after going 19 of 49 passing for 319 yards, two touchdowns and three interceptions.

Third-down terrors

If the Longhorns weren’t able to avoid third down on Saturday, they wound up punting nearly every time. Texas was an abysmal 3 of 17 on third down and picked up just 21 first down compared to 32 for the Cowboys.

Penalty problems

The Longhorns had 10 penalties in the first half for 85 yards which helped extend multiple OSU drives. Texas finished with 14 penalties for 119 yards while the Cowboys had no penalties.

Tale of two halves for Texas' offense

Saturday looked like a classic Big 12 shootout through two quarters. Aside from Ewers' interception on the first drive of the game, the Longhorns put together some impressive scoring drives capitalized with chunk plays.

But behind an egregious lack of offensive consistency, the Longhorns scored just three points in the second half and showed little ability to work their way out of a funk.

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You can follow Zach Dimmitt on Twitter at @ZachDimmitt7

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