The Texas Longhorns fell out of the rankings quicker than any other preseason No. 1-ranked team following a 2-3 start that culminated in a road loss to Florida on Oct. 5. What started as a season with national championship aspirations, quickly spiraled into a crisis of faith on the Forty Acres. 

Was Arch Manning even good? Did the Texas staff whiff that badly on evaluations along the offensive line and at the skill positions? Would the program be better off if head coach Steve Sarkisian didn’t call plays? The Horns walked into the Red River Rivalry reeling and left with a corn dog and a smile. 

But any hopes that the good vibes would last were dashed with back-to-back road wins in overtime over the bottom of the barrel in the SEC, first at Kentucky and then at Mississippi State. Sure, Texas was technically alive in the SEC race and for a spot in the College Football Playoff. But only technically. The SEC gauntlet would assuredly end any hopes of a CFP run. 

Nobody without burnt orange-colored sunglasses pegged Texas as a College Football Playoff team. They were lucky to have a winning record entering the home game against No. 9 Vanderbilt and the Fightin’ Diego Pavia’s on Saturday in DKR – Texas’ first game in Austin since Sept. 20 against Sam Houston. But for the second time this season, Sark & Co. headed into a matchup with a Top 10 opponent nearly left for dead and emerged with a win and renewed hope. 

The Longhorns are firmly back into the CFP discussion. They’re 7-2 entering the final open date of the season before facing Georgia on the road and Arkansas and Texas A&M at home. Win out and the Horns are undoubtedly in the field. But where it gets interesting is that they can reach the CFP with nine wins. 

Hear me out: Let’s say the Longhorns lose to Georgia on the road on Nov. 15 and then close it out with wins over Arkansas and Texas A&M. Would the committee leave out a Horns squad that has wins over Oklahoma, Vanderbilt, and Texas A&M? Especially if the group’s only losses are on the road to Ohio State, Florida, and Georgia. The same is true if we swap the Georgia and Texas A&M results. 

End the year 2-1 and Texas is headed to the CFP for the third straight season. The committee has told us what it thinks of the Big 12 and the ACC in past seasons and the SEC spent all offseason campaigning for this exact scenario. The powers-to-be in this sport – read the television execs and the commissioners of the SEC and Big Ten – want a higher value placed on strength of schedule and good wins, not overall record. Lane Kiffin has even floated using gambling lines as a deciding factor in CFP selection. 

Last year, three-loss Alabama and Ole Miss missed out in favor of an SMU team that went 11-1 in the regular season before losing to Clemson in the ACC Championship game. But those teams possessed an inexcusable loss or two late in the season that prevented the committee from favoring the SEC. Texas’ only bad loss – in this 9-3 scenario – took place on Oct. 4. That’s long enough to be overruled by the marquee wins that happened later in the year. 

This isn’t a value judgment as much as it is a dose of reality. I’m not here to argue whether a 9-3 Texas would deserve a CFP spot ahead of the second-place Big 12 squad or the runner-up in the ACC. But it’ll happen unless something like TCU in 2022 takes place in which the Big 12 or ACC runner-up went 12-0 in the regular season and was upset in the championship game. That could be BYU or Georgia Tech. Otherwise, Texas would get in. 

This could all be a moot point. The Longhorns will likely be underdogs against Georgia and Texas A&M. Arkansas is a tough matchup, on paper, because of the Razorbacks’ ability to score points in bunches. But with Arch Manning and the offense improving and an elite defensive unit, the Horns are equally capable of finishing the season 2-1 or 3-0 and ending the regular season like we all though: As a CFP team.