Texas Athletics announced Friday that redshirt freshman Quinn Ewers will be the starting quarterback for the Longhorns this fall.

John Bianco, senior associate athletics director, announced head coach Steve Sarkisian’s decision to a group of assembled reporters after an availability with Sarkisian and three other players on Friday.

Ewers, a transfer from Ohio State and former top recruit in the country, beat out sophomore quarterback Hudson Card for the starting job after a competition that spanned summer and fall camp.

“I’m excited for both of these guys,” Sarkisian said Aug. 2 while not giving a specific timeline for when his decision would be made. “They’re both great teammates, both are really coachable, highly competitive, highly driven young men that would love to take the field when the team takes the field on Sept. 3.”

After initially winning last season’s competition before being replaced by former Texas quarterback Casey Thompson against Arkansas in Week 2, Card will play backup again this season. It is unclear whether Card, entering his third season at Texas and a former four-star recruit himself, will be inclined to transfer elsewhere, having lost out to the younger Ewers.

Ewers, who played high school football for Southlake Carroll in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex, originally committed to former Texas coach Tom Herman his junior year before decommiting and choosing Ohio State instead. He then reclassified and enrolled at Ohio State a year early to capitalize on NIL opportunities that the state of Texas restricts high school students from receiving.

After his freshman season at Ohio State, during which he signed over $1.4 million worth of NIL deals, Ewers announced his intention to transfer and committed to the Longhorns a second time in December. Ewers is one of three quarterbacks to ever sport a perfect 1.0000 composite ranking, according to 247Sports. The others are former Texas quarterback Vince Young and class of 2023 Texas commit Arch Manning.

Sarkisian told reporters Thursday that he was close to making a decision on who the starter would be, and that once his decision is made, that quarterback will exclusively work with the first-team in practice going forward. 

Ewers will lead a Texas offense in the season opener against Louisiana-Monroe on Sept. 3 that will be without junior wide receiver Isaiah Neyor and senior offensive lineman Junior Angilau. Both were expected to be key starters this season but went down with season-ending ACL injuries during a scrimmage Aug. 13.