COLUMBUS, Ohio — To kick off the 2025 season, Texas football held Ohio State to 14 points Saturday.

But alas, Texas opened its newest campaign with a 14-7 loss at Ohio Stadium. It was just the fifth time in the last 25 years that the Longhorns have lost despite holding their opponent to 14 points or less, along with twice to Oklahoma in 2001 (14-3) and 2004 (12-0), to Texas A&M in 2006 (12-7) and to Oklahoma State in 2017 (13-10).

“If we can hold a team like that to 14, we’ve got to find a way to score 15,” Texas coach Steve Sarkisian said afterward.

After the game, the Longhorns did not portend to be perfect on defense. Texas gave up a 40-yard touchdown catch by Carnell Tate in the fourth quarter. The Longhorns didn’t sack Ohio State quarterback Julian Sayin once. And as edge rusher Ethan Burke put it, “we had zero (turnovers) today. It’s our goal to get at least three and we didn’t execute today. Ultimately, we still gave up points. It wasn’t perfect.”

There also were the penalties.

Texas was penalized six times for 50 yards, including two key infractions by the defense. On Ohio State’s first scoring drive, the Buckeyes got a reprieve after throwing an incomplete pass on third down at Texas’ 44-yard line when when UT edge rusher Colin Simmons was called for a face mask on a Buckeyes offensive lineman. A few plays later, Ohio State got a free 10 yards on a holding penalty against Texas cornerback Malik Muhammad. The Buckeyes ended up scoring on a fourth-and-goal run.

“Everybody makes mistakes,” All-American safety Michael Taaffe said. “I’m not too worried about when Colin Simmons makes a mistake because all the good plays that he makes also. It was momentum for sure. You get a third-down stop and you get a flag and self-inflicting wounds, that hurts.”

There also was a key penalty that didn’t end up on the stat sheet.

Trailing 7-0 in the third quarter, Texas seemingly scored its first points of the game when the Buckeyes were flagged for holding in their own end zone. Those two points, however, remained off the scoreboard because the SEC officiating crew cited UT linebacker Liona Lefau for an illegal hands to the face penalty. Those two infractions on the play offset and Ohio State eventually punted.

“It’s just an unfortunate event,” Lefau said. “Obviously that’s not what we’re taught, to put hands to the face, but it’s kind of a bang-bang play. I was trying to shed a block and my hands accidentally got a little too high and ended up touching his face.”

“The untimely penalties sometimes are unfortunate,” Sarkisian said. “I’m sure there’s some calls that they were saying should have been calls on us. I’m probably going to turn in plays too that I think might have been penalties that didn’t get called. That’s part of football.”