Five straight double-digit midweek wins to start the season have given way to back-to-back embarrassing losses for the No. 2 Texas Longhorns with the latest coming at Schroeder Park on Tuesday after head coach Jim Schlossnagle’s team took a seven-run lead before giving up nine unanswered in a 9-7 defeat by the Houston Cougars.
Command issues continued for Max Weiner’s pitching staff after moving freshman right-hander Sam Cozart to the weekend bullpen despite a solid start by sophomore right-hander Jason Flores, who allowed one hit over three scoreless innings, hitting two batters before departing after Texas took a 4-0 lead in the top of the fourth inning.
Freshman right-hander Brody Walls worked around a one-out double in his first inning, entering the game again after the Longhorns scored three runs in the fourth only to allow a one-out bunt single, hit the next batter with his first pitch, and then issue a four-pitch walk.
When redshirt junior Ethan Walker came out of the bullpen, the junior college transfer traded a run for an out, but couldn’t limit the damage when Houston standout Tre Broussard drove in two runs with a single to center field to make it 7-3.
A 1-2-3 sixth inning from Walker was the final scoreless inning for the Longhorn relievers as junior right-hander Hudson Hamilton gave up a solo home run to former Texas outfielder Easton Winfield on his second pitch to start the seventh inning. Winfield entered the game hitting .200.
On an 0-2 pitch to the next hitter, Hamilton gave up a double down the left-field line before managing a strikeout, but lost the strike zone in walking the next batter on four pitches.
With senior right-hander Max Grubbs into the game, the defense for the Longhorns misfired when a throwing error by junior catcher Andrew Ermis allowed an unearned run to score, although Grubbs was able to retire the final two batters of the inning.
The eighth inning went even more poorly for Texas. Graduate left-hander Cal Higgins replaced Grubbs to start the frame and induced a groundout to second base by the leadoff batter, then allowed the game-tying home run on the next pitch.
Winfield continued to torment his former team with an infield single that prompted Schlossnagle to call in junior right-hander Thomas Burns. In a sign of things to come, Burns struck out the first batter he faced on an 0-2 pitch that hit him, gave up a four-pitch walk, and allowed an 0-2 RBI single. After walking Broussard, Burns couldn’t find the strike zone at all on another four-pitch walk to hand the Cougars a two-run lead heading into the ninth inning.
The Texas batters went down 1-2-3 in the ninth to end a poor hitting performance that only featured three hits for the Longhorns, who were able to take advantage of 11 walks and three errors by the Cougars, but also stranded 10 base runners in going 2-for-12 (.167) with runners on base, 1-for-6 with runners in scoring position (.167), and 1-for-6 (.167) with the bases loaded, missing multiple opportunities to create a bigger, more secure lead.
But after the last several weeks, it’s not clear how big of a margin is actually secure with a bullpen that is suddenly in chaos as the back end has melted down with multiple poor appearances from two of the experienced, high-leverage arms — Higgins and Burns, who are both struggling to throw strikes and are giving up big hits when they do manage to find the zone.
The bottom line is that Texas has lost two straight midweek games to teams with extremely mediocre records in addition to blowing consecutive Friday night leads in conference play. So there’s mounting concern heading into the Red River Showdown that begins on Thursday against No. 8 Oklahoma in Austin, exacerbated by a shaky offense that doesn’t feature many options for Schlossnagle with the injury to sophomore outfielder Jonah Williams and the 2025 MLB Draft defections of Jack Moroknek and Kaleb Freeman.
