In an emotional week after the death of Darrell K. Royal Texas started off the game in an almost perfectly appropriate fashion.

The defense forced a punt on Iowa State’s opening drive, leaving Texas with the ball on its own five-yard line. Despite the poor positioning Mack Brown wasn’t deterred from lining up in the wishbone in honor of Royal. And it was a heck of a tribute.

David Ash tossed the ball to Jaxon Shipley, who rolled right and then threw it back across field to Ash, who then laid out a pretty 47-yard pass to Greg Daniels up the left sidelines. The drive stalled from there, but the Longhorns have played well in the opening half as they enter with a 20-7 lead.

Johnathan Gray kicked off the scoring for Texas, punching the ball in from five yards out on the Longhorns second drive. On the next series, Ash and Mike Davis hooked up on a perfectly-executed 67-yard deep bomb, which put Texas up 14-0.

Texas gained its third touchdown of the half on a three-yard pass to Barrett Mathews in the left corner of the end zone. However, Anthony Fera missed to point after, leaving Texas with a 20-0 lead.

Iowa State put together an impressive end of half drive though, pushing the ball up field with quick passes to score in just over two minutes and enter the half down 13.

The defense had played rather well before that final drive, and Ash had on of the best halves of his career, passing for 245 yards and a pair of touchdowns with a 15-of-16 mark.