The opening script is one key to determining how Quinn Ewers plays

Texas fans, Florida followers, and the college football public have had just over a week to closely scrutinize Longhorns quarterback Quinn Ewers. His lackluster play that resulted in a temporary benching against Georgia was followed a good response against Vanderbilt in Nashville, but discussions about interceptions and average depth of target have plenty wanting more from a quarterback that was once a betting favorite to win the Heisman.

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So, in preparation for his next game, how did Ewers look on the practice field following Vanderbilt and even in Monday’s session?

“I thought Quinn had a good week,” Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian said. “He looks fresh. He looks healthy. He’s really delivering the ball well. I like this base that he’s operating with. I thought he was really intentional with his feet and with his base against Vanderbilt, and it showed.”

Since Ewers suffered an abdominal injury that knocked him out of the UTSA win, he hasn’t looked quite like himself. There were plays made in the Oklahoma win that went a long way toward improving Ewers’ record against the Sooners to 2-1, but those plays were decidedly absent versus Georgia and led to a brief time on the Texas sidelines.

At Vanderbilt, Ewers made a number of quality throws, but the two turnovers were costly as the Commodores took advantage to the tune of 14 points off those turnovers. The stout Texas defense backed Ewers up in the end, as did Texas’ special teams, to get the Longhorns into the bye with a victory in hand.

An effective way for the Longhorns to dive into their final four games of the regular season plus whatever else may come would be to get the third-year signal-caller off to a good start in the remaining contests. That involves a script that Sarkisian has said he goes over with his quarterbacks the night before games and includes plays his starters and backups like and feel comfortable with.

There are also other motives behind what for Sarkisian is usually the first 15-20 plays of the game.

“As far as the script, I want to call stuff that gives us the best chance to have some success, maybe gathers a little bit of information on the opponent on how they’re going to play us, and gets them burning a little bit of chalk on their sidelines,” Sarkisian said.

Sometimes Sarkisian comes out flinging the pigskin from sideline-to-sideline with a number of vertical shots mixed in. Sometimes there’s a balance created by the run game.

For the sake of a 50-50 split, here’s a look at how Ewers has fared in his first seven passes of every start this season.

• Colorado State: 5-for-7 for 92 yards, 13.1 ypa
• Michigan: 4-for-7 for 48 yards, 6.9 ypa
• UTSA: 6-for-7 for 70 yards, 10.0 ypa
• Oklahoma: 4-for-7 for 39 yards with 1 INT, 5.6 ypa
• Georgia: 5-for-7 for 17 yards, 2.4 ypa
• Vanderbilt: 6-for-7 for 65 yards with 1 INT, 9.3 ypa
• TOTALS: 30-for-42 for 331 yards with 2 INT, 7.9 ypa

There’s good and there’s bad in those numbers, with hot starts against Colorado State, UTSA, and even Vanderbilt counterbalanced by the ingrained images from the 30-15 loss against the Bulldogs in Austin.

But for Ewers’ most successful games, a quality start has been almost essential for quality finish. That’s not just a Ewers thing, as Sarkisian explained. However, when it comes to a position Sark describes as the most important in sports, it can go a long, long way.

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“At the end of the day, I’m always trying to put our guys in a really good position to be successful,” Sarkisian said. “I think our offensive staff and our staff in general tries to do that. This week won’t be any different. We’re just going to try to put together something they believe in, they have confidence in, that they show us in practice they know how to operate at a high level regardless of what defense they get.”