Special teams let Texas down against Tennessee
· Yahoo Sports
Last Saturday’s 20-17 win by the Texas Longhorns over the Tennessee Volunteers moved the special teams unit coordinated by Jeff Banks up from No. 25 to No. 22 in the ESPN SP+ rankings even though the mixed results from the non-conference schedule trending in negative directions in some key areas, including the punt unit after giving up a massive return touchdown to the Vols.
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On Monday, head coach Steve Sarkisian addressed the play from the third phase, starting with kickoffs by senior Gianni Spetic, who made a significant error and saw his touchback rate drop significantly.
“G’s had a great year for us, but kickoff wise, that was not who we’ve seen him to be. We’ve had three home games here, and this guy’s knocking every ball out of the end zone, we’re not getting returns,” Sarkisian said. “Saturday, all of a sudden, he’s not striking the ball the way he’s capable of. The last one we kick out of bounds, they get the ball at the 35-yard line.”
The 77.2-percent touchback rate for Spetic through three games dropped to 20 percent on five kickoffs at Neyland Stadium as Tennessee with returns of 17 and 19 yards. The problem is that Spetic’s kickoff early in the second quarter that resulted in the 19-yard return only traveled to the 9-nine yard line.
The timing of the kickoff out of bounds is more concerning — the Longhorns have just scored a touchdown to go up 20-10 with 5:41 remaining in the fourth quarter, momentum immediately sapped by the strong starting field position for the Vols.
Fortunately for Texas, the defense responded by forcing a turnover on downs.
“So, was that the environment? Was that something he was doing fundamentally? We’ve got to clean that up,” Sarkisian said.
According to the game notes, the wind wasn’t a factor at five miles per hour.
The punt game was an even bigger problem because Tennessee was able to tie the game at 10-10 early in the third quarter on a 57-yard punt return touchdown by Qua Moss, the first punt return touchdown allowed by Texas since 2013.
QUA MOSS PUNT RETURN TOUCHDOWN. GAME IS TIED! pic.twitter.com/vCluGMp5yg
— gmannVOLS (@gmannVOLS) September 26, 2026
The primary job of getting Moss to the ground falls on the Texas gunners, freshman wide receiver Kohen Brown and senior running back/wide receiver Ryan Niblett, but Brown was late to beat his block and Niblett wasn’t able to shed his block at all, leaving the less athletic coverage unit players to make the tackle.
Junior safety Jordon Johnson-Rubell, who gained 23 pounds since last season, didn’t come close, and neither did senior linebacker Justin Cryer or senior defensive end Colton Vasek, who allowed Moss to get outside and beat senior punter Mac Chiumento.
But the inability to get Moss to the ground was largely Chiumento’s fault.
“We’re a directional punt team. We’re always trying to punt the ball to the numbers, whether it’s into the boundary, to the field, and everyone wants to talk about the coverage unit,” Sarkisian said. “Well, the long punt return for the touchdown, we punt the ball right down the middle of the field. That’s not ideal when you’re trying to cover punts.”
According to the Texas head coach, the Longhorns have stressed the return game, but made some errors in that phase, too, so even though Niblett was able to return four punts for 57 yards, there were yards left on the field.
Early in the second quarter, Johson-Rubell was called for a block in the back penalty on a 14-yard return by Niblett that cost the Longhorns 10 yards of field position, but that penalty wasn’t as impactful as Niblett simulating a fair catch on a 25-yard return by freshman wide receiver Jermaine Bishop.
Pretty sick idea from Jeff Banks
— Coach Dan Casey (@CoachDanCasey) September 26, 2026
Drop out the Gunner and have the Punt Returner Bluff the return opposite.
Niblett got called for signaling fair catch, but a really cool idea! pic.twitter.com/X0cE9Ow7LN
With Tennessee kicking from one hash, Banks anticipated a directional punt down the sideline to take away Niblett’s ability for a big return — the default tactic against the dynamic return man — lining Bishop up in a double team over the gunner, but dropping the speedster deep on the snap. Making a nice over-the-shoulder catch, Bishop was able to make a player miss and give Texas excellent field position in Tennessee territory.
Instead, the ball was placed at the spot of Niblett’s fair catch signal at the Texas 32-yard line in a major loss of field position.
“We didn’t practice that,” Sarkisian said of the fair catch signal. “All we did was practice running over and falling down, so we’ve got to do the things that we’re practicing.”
And although Texas impacted the late field-goal attempt by Ohio State that missed badly, the Longhorns haven’t blocked any punts or field-goal attempts this season.
“The block game is always something that needs to be part of our repertoire, whether it’s punt block or field-goal block, so we won’t ever stop exhausting ourselves there,” Sarkisian said.
Sarkisian also made a call for improved depth on special teams with starters like Cryer (12) and fellow senior linebacker Rasheem Biles (11) logging significant snaps in the third phase against Tennessee with both playing seven snaps on punt coverage, a high-effort unit.
“The biggest thing on special teams we need to get is we need more depth. If Juice Cryer and Rasheem Biles and Jelani McDonald, these guys are going to play this many snaps on defense — which deservedly so — we need other guys taking some of the heat off these guys on punt, punt return, kickoff coverage, and so we need the depth to step up. I think that’s where we need to place an emphasis on who can we count on to be in those positions to play on special teams to take the load off of those guys so that they can keep being the players that they are on defense,” Sarkisian said.
Because Biles and McDonald played every snap against the Volunteers and Cryer only missed one, Sarkisian’s comment represented a real challenge to backups and young players on the team to emerge during the bye week and earn some playing time in a critical area of the game the Horns need to improve upon in multiple different areas.