On Second Thought: Maybe We Shouldn't Have Become So Hooked On Texas Football
By Wendell Barnhouse
The University of Texas, one of the nation’s largest and most-respected public universities, doesn’t ban books, especially the classics. But perhaps it’s a good time to hide every copy of “Great Expectations.”
When quarterback Sam Ehlinger, giddy with a Sugar Bowl victory over Georgia of the bullying Southeastern Conference, accepted his MVP trophy he put Texas under the microscope for this season. “Longhorn Nation,” he crooned, ‘’we’re baaaaack.”
Even after a 10-4 season that appeared to provide an on-ramp for 2019 success, the Longhorns are still on their journey to wherever “back” is. “Texas is back” has become commentary and three-word punchline ever since Colt McCoy’s shoulder broke on the first offensive possession, leading to a loss to Alabama in the 2009 national championship game.
What is becoming apparent is that from historical perspective, Texas is right where it should be.
The Longhorns will close out this decade having lost at least four games each of the 10 years. That was sealed when Texas lost at Iowa State Saturday on a last-play field goal. For Orangebloods, the opponent was italicized. “We freaking lost to Iowa State?” The loss was not only UT’s fourth this season, it ended any realistic chance of returning to the Big 12 championship game.
Those UT fans who were hoping for some magical mystical lightning strike delivering a national title in the 150th anniversary of the sport need to study the last 50 years. Since Texas won the national championship in the sport’s centennial season, the season records of the last 10 years is on-brand.
For the sake of simple assessments, let’s call a season with double-digit victories a success and a season with four or more losses … well, not a disaster, but far from what should be the standard at Texas.
In the 30 years from 1969 to 1999, Texas won 10 more games nine times and lost four or more 16 seasons (much of that time with just an 11-game schedule and with much of that playing in a watered-down Southwest Conference.
That made the first decade of the 21st century the exception to the rule. The Longhorns won 10 or more games nine times under coach Mack Brown. If not for the 2005 national championship – made possible by Vince Young’s incandescent performance – Brown would have forever been known as Coach February. The Longhorns always were credited with landing a top five recruiting class but were able to parlay that talent into finishing No. 1 just once.
Over the last 50 years, Texas has 19 seasons with 10 or more victories and 25 seasons with four or more victories.
Let’s compare that to four other programs over the last half century:
· Alabama: 29 seasons with 10 or more victories, 11 seasons with four or more losses.
· Oklahoma: 28 seasons with 10 or more victories, 15 with four or more losses.
· Ohio State: 26 seasons with 10 or more victories, 12 with four or more losses.
· Florida State: 24 seasons winning 10 or more, 19 with four or more losses.
For the knee jerk, snap-shot analysis, Texas is closer to mediocre than elite. In the Big 12, it’s closer to the middle than the top. Oklahoma State (six), TCU (five, three in the Big 12), Baylor (four) and Kansas State (two) had more 10-win seasons this decade than the Longhorns.
What was evident Saturday in Ames was that not only were the teams nearly equal in talent, the Cyclones – to borrow a phrase from Charlie Weis – had a schematic advantage. The numbers supported the eye test. Iowa State had the better quarterback, the better running back/running game, the better receivers and the better defense.
This is Year Three for Tom Herman at Texas. Instead of a wunderkind growing up to be a coaching god, he appears to be Just Another Coach with a Mensa membership and quotable catch phrases (“championship-level urine).
Oklahoma’s Lincoln Riley is the Big 12’s coaching god and the conference has two others rising quickly - Iowa State’s Matt Campbell and Baylor’s Matt Rhule. Chris Klieman (Kansas State), Matt Wells (Texas Tech) and Neal Brown (West Virginia) in their first years have indicated they were the right hires for those three schools.
After the Iowa State loss, Herman was asked if he had been outcoached. Texas held a 21-20 lead with 4:01 remaining. Starting at its own 15, the Longhorns needed at least one first down to kill some clock. Instead, their final offensive possession last 61 seconds. Running plays on first and second down gained zero and an incomplete pass resulted in a clock-stopping three and out.
Texas started the possession with 54 yards rushing on 24 attempts. Herman and his staff played it by the book with two running plays. The second guessers and hindsighters asked if Herman was “outcoached.” He brushed that off Saturday but on Monday said, “Any time you lose a game, you’re out-coached.”
Longhorns running back Keaontay Ingram, asked about the running game fizzling, said, “They played us different.” Hmmmm. In-game coaching adjustments, anyone? Ignoring ”the book” and passing to run out the clock, anyone?
Austin American-Statesman columnist Kirk Bohls has been writing about the Longhorns since he stepped on campus in the late 1960s. When he raises doubts and points out problems, it’s not for click bait and it’s not knee jerk. His Tweet could be likened to the maybe-it’s-true story that LBJ realized his Vietnam problem was lethal when “he lost Walter Cronkite.”
Texas plays at Baylor Saturday. While the Bears’ stunning second-half collapse against Oklahoma ruined a perfect day in Waco, the next game will be just as important even if College GameDay is elsewhere. Playing the Longhorns is a holy war for Baylor.
Rhule, like Herman, is in his third season. After a 1-11 in Year One, Rhule had Baylor 9-0 before the OU collapse. His coaching job in three seasons – particularly at a school scarred by a horrific sexual assault culture – has been excellent.
Saturday’s game isn’t a referendum on Herman’s job. But if Texas loses to drop to 6-5 and Baylor is 10-1, Herman had better begin plans for remaking his staff, starting with both coordinators.
Earlier this week, Bohls wrote about this season of disappointment, the issues facing Texas and asked these questions:
Where is Texas?
Who is Texas?
Answers from Your Veteran Scribe:
Not back.
And, to paraphrase Dennis Green, not who we thought they were.