Tramel: TCU breaks barrier for Big 12 by reaching College Football Playoff title game

A Christan folk song from the 1970s was entitled “Have You Kissed Any Frogs Today?”

I never heard the song back then. Didn’t even know what it meant. But I thought of the title Saturday when Texas Christian quarterback Max Duggan trotted onto the field to take the Fiesta Bowl’s final snap.

The Horned Frogs had completed a 51-45 upset of Michigan, and the Big 12 finally had placed a team in college football’s national championship game, and I feel like kissing every frog I can find.

What a day for college football. What a day for the Big 12.

Sonny Dykes’ Horned Frogs cracked the code. Crashed the party. Boldly went where no commoners have gone before. To the final Monday night of the season.

TCU already had done what the 2014 Horned Frogs and 2014 Baylor Bears and 2021 Oklahoma State Cowboys almost did. Reach the playoff, to the exclusion of a blueblood school.

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But they all came up short, either by inches or votes. Then came TCU 2022, and the Frogs can go from princes to kings.

TCU has taken the step that OU four times failed to take. And a league that 18 months ago was left for dead when OU and Texas pledged to the Southeastern Conference, suddenly is prospering.

A new television contract that guarantees solvency. A new status, with four schools in major bowls the last two postseasons, none of them the Sooners or Longhorns. And now a team on college football’s biggest stage.

Alabama and Ohio State, Clemson and Notre Dame, Southern Cal and Michigan, all will join OU and Texas watching the Horned Frogs play for the 26½-inch, gold-plated, stainless steel trophy.

“TCU made it before us,” former Sooner star Nik Bonitto lamented via Twitter.

What a country.

"Michigan's got 750,000 alumni and we've got 75,000, whatever it is," said Dykes, embellishing a little but not much (550,000/90,000). “And that's just the way it is.

“I mean, you always have to fight for credibility. It's part of the deal. It's part of what makes TCU great, though, is that they roll their sleeves up, they go to work, they figure out a way to do it. ... That's why there's so much excellence at the place.”

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Roll up their sleeves. That’s been a Big 12 mantra since the dark days of the OU/Texas exodus.

Georgia’s 42-41 survival of Ohio State in the Peach Bowl later Saturday was even more dramatic than the Fiesta. But not as important.

College football’s closed society opened a little more in Glendale, Arizona. On occasion, the four-team playoff has granted access to a program a little shy of blueblood status. But Michigan State 2015 and Washington 2016 are tradition-rich schools.

Then came Cincinnati a year ago, and now TCU, with the Frogs advancing.

A program that won 26 games in the 1970s and 34 in the 1980s, a program that was bypassed by the original Big 12 in the 1990s and banished to mid-major status, has made it to the Big Bowl.

TCU gives hope to all the little guys. The Horned Frogs were 23-24 the previous four seasons, including 15-21 in the Big 12.

And while Dykes was imported from SMU, the Horned Frogs didn’t import Duggan, their Heisman-finalist hero. Duggan’s a four-year starter; the previous three seasons, nine Big 12 quarterbacks have been named first-team, second-team or honorable mention all-conference. Duggan was not among them.

Yet Duggan turned into a senior star, and Saturday, he led the Frogs past mighty Michigan. TCU matched Michigan in big plays and toughness.

The Wolverines penetrated the TCU 20-yard line seven times. The Horned Frogs penetrated the Michigan 20-yard line five times. But the Wolverines twice were turned away. There’s your ballgame.

“It was kind of an old-fashioned Big 12 shootout in some ways," Dykes said. "But like I said, we came out with a very physical mindset. It was a physical football game. And ... we were the most physical team on the field tonight, and I think that was easy to see.”

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The Horned Frogs took issue with Michigan linebacker Junior Colston, who a few days before the Fiesta Bowl wasn’t sure of TCU’s conference. “They’re in the Big 12, right?” Colston asked.

Forgive Colston. Not every college football player is a college football fan, and conference realignment has rearranged the deck chairs. But still, there was a general attitude among the Wolverines – and everyone else – that Michigan would bully the Frogs.

“I definitely would say, we used it as a little bit of a motivation," TCU linebacker Dee Winters said. "We feel like the Big 12 is a very physical conference. We just wanted to come out and showcase what the Big 12 is all about."

Mission accomplished. TCU proudly flies the Big 12 flag, beating even the Sooners to the final game. A beleaguered league stands tall, and hope spreads throughout the sport.

Kiss a frog today.

Berry Tramel: Berry can be reached at 405-760-8080 or at btramel@oklahoman.com. He can be heard Monday through Friday from 4:40-5:20 p.m. on The Sports Animal radio network, including FM-98.1. Support his work and that of other Oklahoman journalists by purchasing a digital subscription today. 

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TCU vs. Georgia

KICKOFF: 6:30 p.m. Monday, Jan. 9, at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles (ESPN)

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: TCU reaches College Football Playoff championship game, boosts Big 12