2012 Pre-season Rankings: #6 Texas Longhorns

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Texas Longhorns  (Big Twelve #2)

#6	2011 Results	Record: 8-5	Strength:#19  Success:#25  Overall:#20
		AP #30  USA #28	Bowl: Beat Cal 21-10 (Holiday)
	2012 Outlook	Record: 9-3	Picks: Lindy's #19; Athlon #11; Steele #7
		AP #15  USA #15	Bowl: Sugar Bowl (Eligibility odds: 99.8%)

After slumming for two seasons with the losing teams and the "others receiving votes" Texas will be back firmly in the top 25, maybe even the top 10.

Offense 8 RS	'11 Scoring Offense: #55 (raw) #38 (adjusted for competition)
	'12 Projected Scoring Offense: #24 (adjusted)

A team without a 1,000 yard rusher, no 1,000 yard receiver, and nearly without a 1,000 yard passer is going to have a top 25 scoring offense in 2012.

Passing Game	'11 Passing Rank: #88 (raw) #82 (adjusted)	'11 Sacks Allowed (adj.): #76
	'12 Projected Passing Rank: #61 (adjusted)	'12 Sacks Allowed (proj.): #69

If it wasn't clear in 2010 it became very clear early in the 2011 season that Texas wasn't going to win under Garrett Gilbert (247 yards, 1 TD, 2 int), so David Ash and Case McCoy took over. It never became clear which of them helped the team more—or hurt it less—as each had just over 1,000 passing yards. McCoy had a better percentage, 61 to 57; more TDs, 7 to 4; and fewer picks, 4 to 8. But he also had a penchant for fumbling and Ash ran the ball better. A decision of sorts has been made—Ash is the starter. But both will play, and the competition will continue. The team's top four receivers are back including Mike Davis (609 yards) and Jaxson Shipley (607), now a sophomore. The line only loses one full-time starter so protection should improve and with both QBs more experienced the passing game should elevate to "average."

Rushing

'11 Rushing Rank: #19 (raw) #17 (adjusted)

'11 Projected Rushing Rank: #11 (adj.)

Texas had a lot of people running the ball last year, with Malcolm Brown leading (742 yards), Joe Bergeron at #2 with 463, and Fozzy Whitaker with 386. Whitaker is gone but the top two are back, as are four of the six others who topped 100 for the season. The offensive line returns three full-time starters, Mason Walters, Trey Hopkins, and Dominic Espinosa, along with half-time starter Josh Cochran. The ground game should be better, bordering the top ten as they bring in the nation's top running back recruit for the 2nd straight year.

'11 Adjusted Stats:	Rush Defense: #4    Pass Defense  per-game: #7   Per-attempt: #7
Defense 6 RS	'11 Scoring Defense: #36 (raw) #5 (adjusted)	'11 sacks: #27	'11 picks: #14
	'12 Projected Scoring Defense: #10 (adjusted)	'12 sacks: #15	'12 picks: #3

With Jackson Jeffcoat (8 sacks, plus 13 tackles for loss) and Alex Okafor (7 sacks) back on the 4-3 defensive line, the Longhorn pass rush figures to top last year's 29 sacks. They'll probably slip from the top 5 in rush defense due to losses at linebacker however. Emmanual Acho (#1 with 131 tackles, 16 tackles for loss) and Keenan Robinson (106 tackles) are both gone. Pass defense looks even stronger though as Kenny Vaccaro is back along with Carrington Byndom and Quandre Diggs who combined for 30 pass breakups and 6 interceptions. Overall, however, the loss of their top two linebackers knocks the defense back a bit, but they should still be a borderline top ten unit.

Special Teams/Situations

• Kicking Game:  Justin Tucker was both punter (39.2 average) and kicker (17 of 21 attempts) last year and he departs. Penn State transfer Anthony Fera (42.0 average, 14 of 17 FG) looks to fill both positions, but he's injured and will be out at least the early part of the season. Another transfer, Alex King from Duke had a 42.1 yard punting average last year, so he'll fill in early at least, while freshmen Nick Jordan and Nick Rose battle for the kicking job.
• Return Game:  Last year Fozzy Whittaker had two touchdown returns on kickoffs in just 10 attempts, but he's gone. Quandre Diggs averaged 20.1 yards per punt return (mostly due to an 81-yard, non-touchdown return). Diggs handled kickoffs too (19.5 ave) and will again along with D.J. Monroe. 
• Turnovers projection:  Texas should have a better turnover ratio this year as the defense gets more interceptions than last year's 12 and the quarterbacks throw fewer than last year's 14.

Coaching/Recruiting      2012 Recruiting Rank: #1          2011 Recruiting Rank: #8
After a top ten class for 2011, Mack Brown brought in our #1 class for 2012. With over a dozen consensus blue-chip recruits, the class features two of the very top recruits in the nation. Jonathan Gray is probably the nation's #1 running back, making it two years in a row that the Longhorns have the top RB recruit in the country (last year it was Malcolm Brown). Confusingly, this year the Longhorns also got Malcom Brown, one of the top-rated defensive tackles this year.

2011 Recap
Everyone (except us?) was expecting Texas to prove that 2010 was an aberration and that they'd quickly be back in the top 25. By game two it was clear that it wasn't going to be that easy as Texas had to dump Garrett Gilbert. They edged the BYU 17-16, then blasted UCLA 49-20 in revenge for last season. By the time they handed Iowa State its first loss, Texas really was back in the top 25 going into a showdown with Oklahoma. That game embarrassed the Longhorns 55-17 and made QBs Ash and McCoy look stupid. The Longhorns played Oklahoma State a lot closer but they fell to 5-2. They had two more solid outings against Kansas (a 43-0 shutout win) and Texas Tech (52-20), but fell apart in their last four games. The offense was awful, scoring 5 (3, really), 13, 27 (20), and 24 points, and they lost three of the four. The running game that was the team's offensive engine began to fall apart against Missouri when they lost Whittaker, and later injuries to Brown and Bergeron made it worse. Against Cal in the Holiday Bowl things were good again thanks to the defense and they won 21-10.

2012 Outlook

Texas 2012 schedule & forecast
9/1	Sat	vs.	Wyoming	98%	W
9/8	Sat	vs.	New Mexico	99%	W
9/15	Sat	@	Mississippi	92%	W
9/29	Sat	@	*Oklahoma State	48%	L
10/6	Sat	vs.	*West Virginia	77%	W
10/13	Sat	N	*Oklahoma	32%	L
10/20	Sat	vs.	*Baylor	87%	W
10/27	Sat	@	*Kansas	96%	W
11/3	Sat	@	*Texas Tech	76%	W
11/10	Sat	vs.	*Iowa State	89%	W
11/24	Sat	vs.	*TCU	83%	W
12/1	Sat	@	*Kansas State	66%	W
Straight up: 10-2  Cume: 9-3  Undefeated: 3%

 

The early schedule has three good "trial" games (Wyoming, New Mexico, and Ole Miss) for the quarterback competition and then a bye week, but come Oklahoma State hopefully there will be a clear starter. The early games should be wins regardless of any quarterback controversy. The Cowboys are beatable but they're at home and who knows how good they'll still be.

Texas should be able to beat West Virgina in Austin, but then they face the Sooners, which should either be their first or second loss of the year.

The next six games should all be wins, with challenges at Texas Tech and in particular at Kansas State. None can be considered easy, as Baylor, Iowa State, and TCU are all tough even if mostly down a few notches this year.

The cumulative projection averages out to just below 9.5 wins, so it's 9-3 even as the most likely outcome is 10-2, which is also our straight up or game-by-game pick. The Longhorns have a 3% chance of going undefeated, but if they are the #2 Big Twelve team they'd be in line for a BCS Bowl, and given the order of picks they'd probably end up in the Sugar Bowl vs. the Alabama/LSU loser (we have LSU).

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