Hudson on the mend: Our takeaways from Texas' win over UTSA

If you're looking for some warm, positive fuzzies from tonight's 41-20 win over UTSA, it's that this is just the kind of tough game Texas needed in advance of conference play. Hudson Card got the start and led Texas to a 21-point win. The Longhorns trailed early and late in the first half, seemed to get right over halftime and held off an athletic team that won the Conference USA championship last year. This was a trap game and the Horns survived. Bring on the Big 12.

If you're jaded by nature because of most of the last decade of Texas football, this win is filled with lots of trouble signs. The Longhorns were favored by 12½ points but found themselves trailing 3-0, 10-7 and 17-7 in the first half, looked more like last year's team than the one that took Alabama to the brink last week, and — let's face it — struggled to control a Conference USA team that by our count has signed only four four-star recruits in its first 12 years of football.

Takeaways from the win:

Was there a Bama hangover?

Yes. Unless UTSA — which did go 12-2 last year, won the Conference USA title and was 20-8 over the last three years — is being way, way overlooked.

The Longhorns opened with low energy, didn't show that physical oomph that we saw against Alabama, fell behind 3-0 in the first quarter and 17-7 in the second, looked embarrassingly caught off guard on a surprise onside kick, gave up a long touchdown pass on a trick play, missed tackles throughout the first two quarters and just looked off offensively. That was the story of the first half. Steve Sarkisian seemed content to feed Bijan Robinson and take an all-or-nothing approach in the passing game, with three failed deep shots in the first half from Hudson Card to Xavier Worthy. The Longhorns didn't look like 12½-point favorites until the end of the third quarter. By that point, we'd just gotten two "wow" plays — Robinson's 78-yard touchdown run and Jahdae Barron's 43-yard pick-six.

The hope was that the Longhorns would follow up the impressive loss to Alabama with a dominant, physical performance (best case) or at least a solid win powered by a running game and the defense. Instead, we got one frustratingly worrisome half and one closer to what most of us expected.

Hudson Card's performance was a relief

A relief performance literally, as Card got the start — the third of his career — with Quinn Ewers out with the bad clavicle. Card looked fine, at least as far as the ankle goes. He didn't show the limp we saw in the second half against Alabama. Of course, he also didn't look effective on deep throws and the game plan looked like Sarkisian wanted to place more emphasis on the running game and short passes.

More: How did our 20 staff prop bets on the Texas-UTSA play out?

Still, that's about what you'd expect out of the backup. Card was mostly safe tonight. He didn't throw an interception. He completed about 65% of his passes. He finished 15 of 23 for 161 yards and a touchdown. He looked for Xavier Worthy seven times and Jordan Whittington five times, and found Roschon Johnson five times out of the backfield.

Card's now 2-1 as a starter. He'll probably get the start in Lubbock, too. Not that Sarkisian will necessarily tell us that.

Speaking of Big 12 play, is Texas ready?

We'll say yes. Tonight was tougher than expected, maybe tougher than wanted, but the Longhorns toughed their way through it.

The Longhorns start out with Texas Tech — whom they've beaten four straight times — and then a home game with West Virginia, which lost to Kansas last week, before what should be the three defining games of the season all back to back: No. 6 Oklahoma at the Cotton Bowl, then Iowa State at home, then at No. 8 Oklahoma State.

And watch out for those Jayhawks, who are 3-0 with wins over West Virginia and Houston, which was ranked just a week ago.

The three biggest plays of the game

1. Jahdae Barron's 43-yard pick six at the end of the third quarter. It turned a close game into a comfortable lead.

2. Bijan Robinson's 78-yard touchdown run early in the third. It was the longest run of his UT career and it gave him his first 100-yard game of the season. Oh yeah, it also broke a puzzling 17-17 halftime tie.

3. DeMarvion Overshown's sack of Frank Harris that turned into DeMarvion Overshown's ejection for targeting in the fourth quarter. If that holds up, he's going to miss the first half of the Texas Tech game. Harris, who entered the game leading the country in total yardage, didn't return on the following drive, with UTSA down 38-20 with a little less than 10 minutes left in the game.

Texcetera

Offensive player of the game: Bijan Robinson (20-183-3). Defensive player of the game: Jaylan Ford (15 tackles, one forced fumble.) ... Why Jeff Traylor just didn't keep feeding short passes to Oscar Cardenas, we'll never know. Both Anthony Cook and Ryan Watts were on the wrong ends of solo tackle attempts early in the game against the 6-foot-4, 284-pound tight end. Cardenas finished with three catches for 28 yards on four targets. ... Texas beat Louisiana-Monroe 52-10 two weeks ago. Alabama beat ULM 63-7 today. That's how the Crimson Tide responded to last week's close win over Texas that knocked them from No. 1 to No. 2 nationally.

Up next for Texas: Texas Tech, 2:30 p.m. next Saturday in Lubbock (either on ABC or ESPN).

The Red Raiders are 2-1 after today's 27-14 loss to No. 16 North Carolina State. Texas has won four straight over Tech, including two in a row in Lubbock.

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Texas football bounces back against UTSA: Top takeaways from the game