Why was Texas football’s Steve Sarkisian ‘ripping Arch Manning’s ass’ during Mississippi State win?

AUSTIN - Moments after the University of Texas defeated Mississippi State late Saturday afternoon , SEC Network threw the broadcast down to the field, where sideline reporter Alyssa Lang had Longhorns head coach Steve Sarkisian in tow.

Predictably, Lang asked Sarkisian about injured quarterback Quinn Ewers ' status moments after Arch Manning had thrown for 324 yards and two touchdowns, while tacking on a third touchdown on the ground.

"Quinn's a stud, he's getting himself ready to go," Sarkisian said on the broadcast. "I think Quinn's probably helping Arch with me ripping his ass. Even though he's 26-of-31 for over 300 yards, I was still ripping his ass today, but that's what we do around here."

During his normal Monday press conference, Sarkisian was asked in jest what he was "ripping Manning's ass" about. Sarkisian, though, did not take the question in jest. Rather, he took a deep dive on the situation.

On second-and-goal from the 1-yard line late in the third quarter, a designed keeper saw Manning dive under center Jake Majors, appearing to cross the plane of the goal line for a touchdown.

The officials, though, did not signal a touchdown, and instead marked the ball back at the 1, setting up third-and-goal.

"I think he scores, and I think the officials actually think he scores, but he gets up and gets out of the end zone, so by the time they got there, they couldn't tell if he was in the scrum or not," Sarkisian said of Manning, who was starting for the second straight game while Ewers continues to nurse a strained oblique. "I tried to explain it to him on the headset, the beauty of the headset, and he almost did the same thing again."

On third-and-goal from the 1, Sarkisian called the same exact play, a designed keeper for Manning, who plunged forward under center. This time, the officials were able to see Manning cross the plane before signaling a touchdown to give the Longhorns a 21-6 lead after Bert Auburn's extra point.

After the touchdown, an official could be seen talking to Manning 1-on-1 before the latter made his way back to the Texas sideline. Manning said postgame Saturday that the official was advising him.

Once Manning got back to the sideline, Sarkisian took a few seconds to make a point to his quarterback. Monday offered a better glimpse into what that point was.

"Oddly enough, when the play was done, the official came to me, said, 'Hey, remind Arch to stay on the ground so we can see where he's at,'" Sarkisian said. So there's little things like that, and so sometimes it's not always the read, or the poor throw, or something. There's little things that we're trying to coach him on. That's just experience."