The Texas Longhorns went to “The Big House” and put on a great show.

The Longhorns defense put on a clinic in Saturday afternoon’s 31-12 win over the Michigan Wolverines. It’s safe to say Texas coach Steve Sarkisian was pleased with the result.

“Defensively, we kept winning on first down, which put them on second-and-long and third-and-long,” Sarkisian said after the game.

David Gbenda led the rebound with seven tackles and a tackle for loss. Linebacker Anthony Hill also led the Longhorns with six tackles and a tackle for loss.

Safeties Derek Williams and Andrew Mukuba both intercepted a pass from Davis Warren.

“I haven’t played many games where you win the turnover battle 3-0 and you don’t win the game,” Sarkisian said. “We created the turnovers, which was really important. Overall, I’m super proud of our team. We had over 111,000 people in attendance today and they really stepped up.”

Sarkisian said one game, even one as important as Saturday’s, doesn’t define a season, but it does give coaches a sense of where things stand.

“This is a pretty good barometer of the kind of team we can be,” Sarkisian said. “We minimized the explosive plays on defense and we were effective on special teams.”

The defense held Michigan’s powerful offense to 284 yards and just one touchdown. It was a very impressive performance for Texas.

“We weren’t really trying to prove anything,” Sarkisian said. “We wanted to play physical and fast and be able to handle the environment, and we did that.”