Texas EDGE Colin Simmons Makes Wild Claim About CFP Snub

Colin Simmons believes Indiana wouldn't have made CFP history had Texas been in the field.

Colin Simmons believes Texas would've won the CFP if the Longhorns hadn't been left out of the field | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

Texas Longhorns EDGE Colin Simmons has full faith in his team moving forward, but he also has it retroactively for last year's group. Simmons was asked if UT would've won the CFP had the Horns made the field at 9-3 on Thursday.

Simmons left no doubt about his answer and, in the process, took a backhanded swipe at the undefeated champion Indiana Hoosiers.

"Hell yeah, of course. If we would've made the playoffs, I definitely feel like that chip that we had on our shoulders, we would have took it, and we would've ran with it," Simmons said on the final day of 2026 SEC Football Media Days in Tampa.

Simmons likely wasn't trying to call out Curt Cignetti's Hoosiers. It was just confidence in himself and his teammates. Natural athlete behavior. He may have even had a point. Entering the postseason coming off a 27-17 Lone Star Showdown win over the Texas A&M Aggies at DKR Stadium, Texas had momentum. The Longhorns certainly proved that and kept it going in a 41-27 Cheez-It Citrus Bowl win over the Michigan Wolverines.

Simmons may have been right had the CFP selection committee gone down a different path. Unfortunately, the defense didn't click enough early last season, limiting Simmons' sack total and helping contribute to a 3-2 start to a 9-3 season that simply wasn't up to snuff during a strong year from the Group of Six's ranks. Especially not when ESPN positioned the Alabama Crimson Tide favorably in the rankings heading into the SEC Championship Game, enough to survive a 28-7 loss to the Georgia Bulldogs. Then again, even if Alabama had been booted, the Notre Dame Fighting Irish would've been next in line.

The Longhorns Blew Their CFP Chance in Gainesville

Texas' CFP chances ended in the "Swamp" last October | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

To be fair to ESPN's David Hale, who asked that question to Simmons, a three-loss team in the regular season could've only stayed in the CFP conversation if the losses were to teams like the Ohio State Buckeyes and the UGA Dawgs. Of course, two of them were.

That third loss being to the Florida Gators was a season-killer, though, and everyone felt that during the fateful October night in Gainesville. UF was coming off three consecutive losses, one of them at home to the USF Bulls, but Arch Manning had his worst game of the season in the "Swamp," getting sacked six times and throwing two interceptions. The rest was history, in the worst way.

There was no surviving that loss, which only aged more poorly after Billy Napier was fired as the Gators' head coach two weeks later. Steve Sarkisian making the case that the Longhorns should've made the CFP despite that loss, not to mention a 25-point defeat to Georgia, always relied on a false premise.

What's important now, because asking what could've happened isn't, despite being a fun hypothetical, is how this revamped group responds to that adversity. With one of the most expensive rosters and perhaps the most talented, on paper, the Longhorns need to make that "snub" right this fall.

Sark and Arch would take by far the most heat if Texas somehow repeated those disappointing results. Sark might not even be able to survive it should history repeat itself.

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