Texas has the perfect opportunity to let Arch Manning show why he was an elite recruit for the now, and the long term

Injuries are never a good thing, especially for a team like the Texas Longhorns who just rose up to the No. 1 team in the latest AP Poll. Their star quarterback Quinn Ewers is currently dealing with an abdominal strain, one that was thought to be serious at first. Reports have come out that the injury is not nearly as serious as the program once thought, and he will be week to week after the game against Louisiana-Monroe.

Ewers has dealt with some durability issues in the past, and for the short and long term, you hope that this is merely a small blip on the radar. This Longhorn team has a chance to contend for a national championship this season, and will need their star signal caller to do so.

While Ewers is the present, it’s hard not to be overly excited for what the future could hold behind redshirt freshman quarterback Arch Manning . With the injury to Ewers, we saw a lot of Manning against UTSA. During the contest, he completed 9 of 12 passes for 223 yards and four touchdowns. Manning also rushed for 53 yards and another score on just three carries.

The 6-4, 220-pound signal caller is an impressive blend of size, arm talent, and athleticism, which has Texas fans buzzing. With Ewers out, the fans will get to see a lot of Manning for at least one week. When you take a step back, this window of the schedule actually allows you to be patient with the Ewers injury and start to get some insight into what the future could hold in Austin.

During the next two weeks, Texas will play Louisiana-Monroe and then welcome Mississippi State for a home battle. Neither team should be much of a contest. The Warhawks will be of little issue, and Mississippi State should also not be much of a test. The Bulldogs are currently sitting at 0-2, which includes a recent 41-17 loss to the Toledo Rockets.

With all due respect to Mississippi State, you could run nothing but Wildcats that day and potentially win by four or more scores. After that two-game stretch, Texas will then have a bye week before their big matchup against the Oklahoma Sooners on October 12th.

For the sake of the 2024 season, Ewers will need to be healthy for that contest in a little less than a month. Based upon the early action of football, Texas does seem like the better team between them and the Sooners, but anything can happen in the Red River Rivalry. The good news is that there shouldn’t be a massive rush to force him back any earlier,

Manning should be more than enough to handle Louisiana-Monroe and Mississippi State, then you get the bye week to get Ewers back into the groove of things potentially. For Longhorn fans, they get the chance to see an increased amount of Manning for the next couple of weeks potentially.

He is believed to be the future of the program, and his unfortunate circumstance does allow to get an early sneak peek at his talents in a bigger sample size. Why was he regarded as one of the top quarterback recruits to come out in recent memory? We should get a solid answer to that heading into that bye week.

This could, in the long term, end up being a blessing in disguise. You didn’t need Ewers to go 2-0 over the next three weeks anyway, and now he gets a much needed rest to recover.