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Longhorns 52, ULM 10 Notebook: Ja'Tavion Sanders Dominates, Xavier Worthy Quiet
AUSTIN -- Faced with the pressure of how they can respond from a 5-7 season in 2021, the Texas Longhorns came out in Saturday's season-opener against the Louisiana-Monroe Warhawks and left little doubt in a 52-10 win that they are on a steady climb toward improvement.
The dominant win had its highlights, but a fair share of lowlights as well. It's no secret that a Texas win was expected, making the mistakes from both sides of the ball something to note headed into a vastly different matchup with Alabama next Saturday.
From the highs to the lows, let's look at a few takeaways from Texas' win over ULM.
Ewers-Worthy connection? Missed opportunities
Xavier Worthy enters this season with some major expectations after what he did as a freshman. But the early connection with Ewers left more to be desired, especially against an inferior opponent.
Three potential touchdowns was instead three missed opportunities. Ewers targeted Worthy on three deep shots that were overthrown, two of which missed the mark right in the end zone.
Worthy finished with just two catches on a team-high seven targets for 24 yards, as Ja'Tavion Sanders dominated in the passing department. Sarkisian said postgame that the big shots will come, but they didn't on Saturday.
Ja'Tavion Sanders lives up to offseason hype
Sanders was the stereotypical tight end security blanket for Ewers, as he came up with some crucial catches and a few fourth-down conversions.
Steve Sarkisian said during the offseason that Sanders had the best hands on the team. And while he didn't pull out any major one-handers or anything of that nature, his hands proved extremely reliable and was the clear No. 1 option for Ewers in his debut at quarterback.
He led the team with six catches (on six targets) for 85 yards and had his first-career touchdown. The Longhorns will certainly need something resembling a replicate performance next week if they want to upset Alabama.
D'Shawn Jamison: Playmaker
The Longhorns scored two non-offensive touchdowns Saturday all due to the quick play-making of Jamison.
The first score of the game - and of Texas' season - came as the Warhawks were set to punt on their first drive backed up near their own end zone. Jamison came flying through, blocking the punt. Keilan Robinson scooped it up for the score.
Normally a dynamic player in the return game (he has three career scores as a returner), he changed the tide and made one of the biggest plays of the young season.
But then he somehow topped that with a pick-six, the first of his four-year career at Texas.
Texas d-line dominates
Even against a quick dual-threat quarterback like Chandler Rogers, the Longhorns' defensive line was making easy work of the ULM offensive front.
Of course, the Warhawks o-line was offering little resistant on most snaps in the first half. But the Texas front seven - led by the bruising pass-rush of EDGE linebacker Barryn Sorrell with 1.5 sacks and six total tackles - was dominating the point of attack with ease.
You can follow Zach Dimmitt on Twitter at @ZachDimmitt7
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