How the oblique strain suffered by Ewers responds to practicing will determine his availability against Mississippi State.

AUSTIN, Texas — After suffering an oblique strain nine days ago against the UTSA Roadrunners, Texas Longhorns quarterback Quinn Ewers is questionable for Saturday’s SEC opener in Austin against the Mississippi State Bulldogs, head coach Steve Sarkisian said during his Monday press conference, revealing that Ewers participated in morning practice at Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium.

“We’ll see how he does throughout the week and monitor how he responds to tomorrow coming off of today’s practice,” Sarkisian said.

“I was actually impressed by where he was today and that’s been part of his trajectory since the injury happened — I feel like he keeps getting incrementally better day by day.”

But what would it take for Sarkisian to feel comfortable playing Ewers over redshirt freshman quarterback Arch Manning, who made his first collegiate start last Saturday against Louisiana-Monroe, a 51-3 win by Texas?

“He’s just got to do enough to show me you can play… We’ve got a game plan. Can he execute the game plan? I hate to pare it down to that, but that’s really the truth,” Sarkisian said. “Again, I want to make sure he’s healthy enough to play at a high level and can he go operate the game plan that we that we have in place for him.”

With Ewers in his third year starting for Sarkisian on the Forty Acres, there’s a level of trust between the head coach and quarterback. Perhaps more importantly, the two have experience navigating rehabilitation timetables after Ewers suffered an SC joint sprain in his left shoulder the caused him to miss three games and an AC joint sprain in his right shoulder that kept him out two games.

“I think the beauty of it for Quinn and I is our time together, him having to come back from injuries previously, [knowing that] him being honest with me is in his best interest and our best interest and things of that nature and that I’ll do everything in my power to put him in the best position to be successful if he plays and if he doesn’t, what does that look like moving forward?” Sarkisian said.