Column: 'Big, bad' Texas is back
ATLANTA — Back in July in the wake of SEC Media Days, I wrote that the whole idea of Texas football’s redemption arc was over. The Longhorns were done being a feelgood story.
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Here’s what was written on July 24:
Those storylines were fun while they lasted, but the Longhorns’ days of being on the road to redemption are over. Even Sarkisian himself isn’t one to talk about the arduous path he traveled from 2015 to 2023. At this stage, Sark and Texas are done being redeemed. The Longhorns are fighting to entrench themselves at the top of the sport, and Sarkisian is working to prove that his 2023 is the new normal and not a one-off, feelgood story about college football.
Throughout the course of the 2024 season, my assertation has held true. There isn’t interest in the Longhorns like there was for Indiana in 2024. It’s way different.
The interest and attention given to Texas is not all positive. In fact, because Texas was in the top five for most of the season, the Longhorns were a target for people trying to tear them down from their lofty standing as opposed to being treated like an underdog fighter unable to answer the count.
Opponents knew one of the best teams in the nation was about to line up across from them on a week to week basis as opposed to a program that was deploying flawed players and schemes under failing coaches.
To me, that’s indicative of one thing. Big, bad Texas is back.
This isn’t another attempt to play off the whole “back” cliche. What I’ve seen over the past four seasons is Texas returning to a position that it occupied from 2004-2009. Texas is the team that other coaches know comes in ready to play and with a level of execution that requires their best in order to defeat. The only team that has been able to top Texas in 2024 is a Georgia team that has held the ‘big, bad’ description for most of the past 10 years.
It’s also not a look toward Sarkisian’s affinity for “big humans,” though that certainly is a reason why Texas has regained its ‘big, bad’ status. The Longhorns bully their opponents both when they have the ball and when they’re trying to get it back. But it’s not just the big humans. That status is due to workhorse backs like Quintrevion Wisner and All-American defensive backs like Michael Taaffe and Jahdae Barron.
It’s a look at how opponents know they have to bring their best in order to defeat Texas, something that as recent as Sarkisian’s second year as head coach in Austin wasn’t the case.
Just look at how Arizona State defensive back Shamari Simmons is entering this game.
“To me honestly, I like being an underdog because it’s less pressure on us,” Simmons said in recent days. “All the pressure’s on Texas. Texas has got to face a very good team. It’s just all about us just playing free and just knowing that like we deserve to be here.”
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What that statement means to me is that Texas is the team expected to move on to the next round. Of course, the game has to be played and the Longhorns have to block and tackle better than the Sun Devils.
But UT’s ascribed chances of doing so are higher than those for the Sun Devils because Texas is the big, bad team entering this matchup.
Texas suffered almost a full decade of being ridiculed and then bested by teams with a lower talent aggregate. The talent gap has since widened thanks to the Longhorns surging in recent years under Sarkisian’s watch.
Teams are no longer attempting to knock Texas back down. Rather, they’re attempting to scratch and claw at the Longhorns to bring UT down to a different level.
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To me, that means one thing: the Longhorns are the big, bad team in almost all of their matchups these days, and that holds true even in the College Football Playoff quarterfinals.