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Arch Manning, the most famous backup quarterback in American football, will make his first college start for No. 1 Texas on Saturday night against Louisiana-Monroe, replacing the injured Quinn Ewers.
Cooper Manning’s 19-year-old son, Arch, represents the next generation of football royalty in the Manning family. His grandfather, Archie, starred at Ole Miss in the 1960s and played for the New Orleans Saints in the NFL. His uncles, Peyton and Eli, each won two Super Bowls in the NFL after decorated college careers at Tennessee and Ole Miss, respectively.
How did Arch get here and what’s next? Here’s a guide to what you need to know for the Longhorns’ game against the Warhawks, which will be streaming on ESPN+ at 8:00 p.m. ET Saturday.
What has Manning done at Texas so far?
Manning’s tenure at Texas is a bit of a throwback to the way quarterback development used to be before the transfer portal. Manning enrolled at Texas in 2023, redshirted and saw minimal time as the third-string quarterback behind Ewers and backup Maalik Murphy. He made his career debut in the fourth quarter of the Longhorns’ final regular-season game, a 57-7 win over Texas Tech, and led two drives.
Manning saw just 27 snaps in two games last year (he came out the following week to take a knee and kill the clock in the Longhorns’ Big 12 championship game against Oklahoma State), but Murphy transferred to Duke after the season. Ewers opted to stay at Texas for another season rather than enter the draft, becoming the Longhorns’ starter for the third straight season.
Manning is Ewers’ primary backup and is already getting more playing time in 2024, with 55 combined snaps in wins over Colorado State and UTSA. In the 12 drives Manning has led this season, the Longhorns have scored seven touchdowns. For the season, Manning is 14-of-18 passing for 318 yards and five touchdowns with two touchdown runs.
He completed his first five pass attempts in a 52-0 Week 1 win over Colorado State, scoring his first career touchdowns. Against UTSA, Manning came in for an injured Ewers in the second quarter and threw for four touchdowns and ran for 67 yards. He completed 9 of 12 passes for 223 yards in a 56-7 victory over the Roadrunners. — Sam Khan Jr.
CAN’T TOUCH HIM 😮💨@ArchManning photo.twitter.com/65nR57qIR5
—Texas Football (@TexasFootball) September 15, 2024
Why is Manning making his first start now?
Ewers left the UTSA game early in the second quarter with a strained oblique muscle and did not return. Texas coach Steve Sarkisian said Monday that Ewers was “questionable” for Saturday’s game against ULM and that the Longhorns would monitor his progress throughout the week. On Thursday, Sarkisian said Ewers had made “great strides” in his recovery, but in the interest of his long-term health and his career, and to get him healthy for SEC play, they decided to start Manning.
“I’m excited about his future as a player, but also the future of the season for us and the longevity,” Sarkisian said. “It’s good for us to potentially get him another week healthier for the long term as we get ready for SEC play.”
Sarkisian added that Ewers’ goals — leading Texas to a national championship, getting into the Heisman Trophy race and becoming a top-five NFL Draft pick — won’t be derailed by missing Saturday’s game. And Sarkisian wants to see how Manning runs the offense and operates as a starter.
“(He) had a really good week of working, understanding the plan,” Sarkisian said of Manning. “But it’s different when you’re the starting quarterback versus being a backup off the bench. So it’s a different challenge for him. But I know he’s more than ready to go and operate and play football at a high level for us.” -Khan
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Will there be a QB controversy at Texas if Ewers returns?
No. Ewers is the starter. If he is healthy enough to return, he will be QB1.
Manning is a superior talent and figures to be a star when his time comes. He’s good enough to start for most other programs these days. But Ewers has had the opportunity to rise to the occasion in big moments for Texas time and time again and happens to be an elite talent as well. Like Manning in 2023, Ewers was the No. 1 recruit in the 2021 class. He’s a potential first-round pick in the 2025 NFL Draft. He beat Alabama in Tuscaloosa, led the Longhorns to the playoff last year and beat Michigan this year in Ann Arbor. He has 25 starts and three years of experience in this offense. There’s no quarterback controversy for Texas. -Khan
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Will Louisiana-Monroe pose a challenge on Saturday?
The Warhawks were projected to finish last in their division and received the fewest votes in the Sun Belt Conference’s preseason media poll, despite getting off to a nice 2-0 start under new coach Bryant Vincent. They topped UAB, 32-6, on Sept. 7. ULM has 73 new players on the roster, led by Oklahoma transfer quarterback General Booty, who has a connection to Manning even though the two have never met.
Despite the feel-good nature of ULM’s start, don’t expect the Warhawks to be in this game deep into the second half. They’re ranked 100th in the The Athletics‘s ranking of all 134 Football Bowl Subdivision teams and are 44.5-point underdogs on Saturday, according to BetMGM, as the talent gap between the programs is significant. ULM is hoping to reach a bowl game for the first time since 2012, while the Longhorns have their sights set on the playoffs and a national championship run. -Khan
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How did Manning end up in Texas?
No recruit in the modern era has attracted more widespread interest than Manning, who was ranked as the nation’s top prospect in the class of 2023. Manning had his pick of every school in the country as one of the most coveted prospects in recruiting history, but he took official visits to three schools in June 2022: Georgia, Alabama and Texas.
He committed to the Longhorns just six days after his official visit to Austin and roughly 11 months after news broke that Texas would be leaving the Big 12 for the SEC. Texas’ decision made perfect sense for Manning, who was able to spend his early days with the program developing and learning behind Ewers before taking over the offense himself when Ewers left for the NFL.
Sarkisian has long been regarded as one of the game’s most prominent offensive masterminds and has spent his career coaching quarterbacks. After Manning committed, his high school coaches at Isidore Newman School in New Orleans — where his father and uncles played — could sense the peace he felt.
“He’s just in such a good place mentally,” Manning’s high school coach Nelson Stewart said in October 2022. “He’s having fun … and he plays so freely.” —Grace Raynor
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What was Manning like as a recruit?
Experts criticized Manning for the level of competition he faced while at Newman, a Class 2A school, but he was able to combat that stigma when Newman played one of the toughest schedules in program history his senior year, opening the season with a 21-point win over visiting Class 5A Hahnville. Among Manning’s most impressive attributes were his ability to extend plays when things weren’t going his way and the patience to run through multiple reads in his progressions — sometimes even scoring touchdowns on his fifth read. Manning broke Eli’s school record of 7,268 career passing yards and Peyton’s school record of 93 career passing touchdowns. He finished his high school career with 8,599 career passing yards and 115 touchdowns against 20 interceptions, throwing just two interceptions during his senior season.
But as decorated as Manning was on the field, he was one of the least-maintained recruits in recent memory off it. He stayed out of the spotlight as much as possible, announcing his commitment to Texas with his first and only tweet at the time to his personal Twitter page. After committing to the Longhorns, there was never any talk of a potential flip again, and he signed the papers in a ceremony at his high school. —Raynor
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What does Manning’s NFL Draft future look like?
Manning, 19, is eligible for the 2026 NFL Draft after his junior year, but he has three years of college football eligibility remaining after this season because he was inactive as a freshman in 2023.
Physically, at 6’3”, 220 pounds, with real speed, athletic burst and first-round arm talent, Manning seems like an ideal quarterback prospect. It’s possible he could get stronger, but only his burst and agility in the pocket and overall durability would improve in the long run. Frankly, we don’t have enough data at this point to give him a proper draft projection. Relief duty last week against UTSA was the most we’ve seen of Manning, and while it’s a lot of of great things – both with his feet and his arm – it also showed an inexperienced passer who missed the ball a few times and was not always in rhythm.
Manning’s natural quarterback instincts — footwork and processing — are elite, though. He generally plays the game with a rhythm and shows an understanding of a complex offense. Most importantly, he’s patient. The fact that he wasn’t afraid to go to a school like Texas and grind without drama — just because he wants to learn from Sarkisian in a stable environment — shows a kind of maturity you don’t often see in today’s blue-chip quarterback recruits. —Nick Baumgardner
(Photo: Tim Warner/Getty Images)
