What to make of the Texas program after another loss to TCU | Yahoo Sports College Podcast
Yahoo Sports’ Dan Wetzel and Pete Thamel, and Sports Illustrated’s Pat Forde discuss Texas’ 33-31 loss to TCU on Saturday, and explain why we’re in for yet another disappointing season from the Texas Longhorns.
Video Transcript
DAN WETZEL: So look, here's the situation, what do you make of the Texas program? You know, TCU is 7 and 2 against Texas since joining the Big 12. Gary Patterson has their number, Gary Patterson's a better coach than any coach they've had down in Texas. I don't think you can pry Gary Patterson out of Fort Worth.
But this far into the neck-- you know, the latest tenure, you know, at what point is Texas back? What point is Texas Texas again? This was shaping up as a Big 12 that they could romp through, and here you go. So Pete, why don't we start with you? Thoughts on the Longhorn program after losing to the horned frogs again.
PETE THAMEL: So, you know, I wrote this in 10 takeaways on Saturday, and it is fascinating. I mean, this may be the most completely fatalistic Red River Shootout in my lifetime of covering college sports, right? You know, again, I'm not going to spin it to Oklahoma yet, I know we're going to talk about them. But they roll in 0 and 2 and really a shell of what we knew them as.
Texas is just this ball of self-destruction. I mean, the first quarter of Texas-TCU may be the worst quarter of football that I've watched, certainly this year and definitely in a long time. And I really think that Texas is just a mess. There's no other way to say it. They can't tackle, they had 19 missed tackles, I read, against Texas Tech.
That stat hadn't emerged for TCU, but it certainly-- probably wasn't 19 because the other one game into overtime, but certainly wasn't good. The optimism that comes with, we brought in a new defensive coordinator, we brought in a new special teams coach, we have a new wide receivers coach, all the sort of spring storylines of improvement that came along with Texas are pretty much scuttled at this point.
They just looked like a mess. There's no other way to-- there's no other way to really say it.
PAT FORDE: There's no evidence that Texas is back, is on the way back, is anything. Texas is just another program at this point. And no matter how-- what they try, which coach, what facilities they try to upgrade, you know, the recruiting gets better, the results never get better. If they lose, they'd be 1 and 2, really, they should be 0 and 3 next week.
Because, I mean, they were very, very lucky just to beat Texas Tech. So they have just so massively underachieved, it is really perplexing. Change coaches, change staff, whatever, change approaches, it doesn't matter, nothing really changes. They still are incredibly error prone, occasionally very soft.
They just always-- the other team always looks like they're trying harder. Just for some reason, I, you know, again, there seems to be some bizarre sense of entitlement that goes along with putting the Longhorn helmet on or the OU helmet on that isn't matched by the results. Certainly, at Texas, it's not matched by the results because they haven't been any good in quite some time, and there's no signal that that's changing.
DAN WETZEL: TCU is beating Texas most every year. TCU's kids-- TCU gets very good recruits. But a lot-- Texas gets a little better. And I just-- what I don't quite get, and this has been a case for Texas for years now, whether it was, you know, Baylor stepping up or Texas Tech at times, certainly TCU, some of these other schools, how it doesn't seem like Texas matches the in-state intensity on the field in these in-state games.
Like, they still-- it didn't look like they still saw TCU as a rival. Like, they're still looking down on TCU, even though these kids, we're talking nine years. It's not like they-- TCU's new to the Big 12. In their lifetime, basically, TCU's been in the Big 12. But it still feels like they look like it's like, oh, this is just one of these other in-state schools.
Like, this is UTEP, right, we're just going to run UTEP off the field or whoever else they might play in a non-conference in-state. And for too many years now, TCU and Baylor, particularly, have just been-- just better.
