Texas' stunning comeback win over Ohio State was everything college football should be — and it could soon be a thing of the past

AUSTIN, Texas — Hours before the out-of-nowhere comeback, before Darrell K. Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium pulsated with noise and shock, before the “SEC, SEC” chants spontaneously broke out over the din of elation and before thousands of forlorn Ohio State fans walked out into the night having that conversation about Ryan Day once again, a plume of burnt orange smoke seemed to linger over the field in the searing Texas heat. 

It is a standard part of the pregame pyrotechnics here, but it was a particularly poignant image in the moments before a game like this one between two of college football’s biggest brands and highest-ranked teams, with consequences that will take the rest of the season to figure out. 

For 14 Saturdays of college football, we’re all just waiting for the smoke to clear. 

By the end of Texas 24, Ohio State 23, it was a beautiful picture but an incomplete one, made possible only by a regular season that feels increasingly under attack by the powers that be. Year by year, the coaches and administrators at the mega-programs become less interested in playing games like these because the stakes are so high. And yet, without those high stakes of a limited playoff structure where losing this kind of game can knock you out, what kind of sport are you left with? 

“Hopefully it pays dividends for us in December,” Texas coach Steve Sarkisian said late Saturday night. “But we have a lot more meat on the bone we have to chew off here before we can start worrying about whether this win helps us get into a playoff or not.”

Sarkisian is right, of course. We cannot know if one win in mid-September is a golden ticket to the postseason, even one over the No. 1 team in the country. 

But imagine, if you will, this game being played in a world where the carrot at the end of all this is the 24-team College Football Playoff that power conference administrators seem to be sprinting toward as their preferred postseason format — perhaps as soon as next year. 

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Texas coach Steve Sarkisian and the Longhorns celebrate on the field with after their win over Ohio State. (Alex Slitz/Getty Images)

Would it have seemed so dire and disappointing that Texas fell behind 23-3 in the third quarter? Would Sarkisian’s series of fourth-down gambles to jumpstart his team — including a now-or-never roll of the dice on fourth-and-6 from his own 32-yard line with 11:45 left — have stirred the same crescendo of emotion throughout the 105,044 fans in attendance? Would we have learned as much about Arch Manning‘s leadership and composure under real pressure as he completed 11 of his final 15 throws? Would anyone have even cared that Day went into turtle mode with the lead way too early and, frankly, blew a game Ohio State had no business losing? 

“Beating a team like that is, in essence, a win for the season but also serves a little bit of a barometer of where we’re at as a program,” Sarkisian said. “They’re not going anywhere and I told [Day], ‘I hope we see you again because that would be a good sign for both of us.'”

And yet, the greatest thing that happened Saturday night — and the beauty of where college football is right now — is that we just don’t know what it will all mean in December. If Day gets Ohio State to the playoff from here, overcoming a schedule that still includes Indiana, Oregon and USC, he will have earned his $12.5 million salary and then some. If he doesn’t, the seat may warm up again. 

Who knows? But at least every bit of it matters. 

Realistically, in a 24-team playoff world, you can play this exact same game and it will not feel the same. Every player, every coach and every fan will know that two elite college football brands meeting on a stage like this will be a spectacle without a shred of consequence because they will both be ticketed for the postseason in the end.

Sure, everyone will want to win these games but they will not need to. Are we sure that’s a good idea?

Because the essence of college football is what happened here Saturday night: Even in Week 2 of the season, every moment felt like a national championship was potentially on the line. Every dropped pass, every play call, every field goal attempt was massive not just for this game but how the rest of the season will play out. 

Only college football has that intensity and those stakes every single week. That doesn’t seem like something the sport should sacrifice for the sake of a little more TV money and a bloated playoff that gives everyone a trophy. 

“We could be like some other teams and play Jones Junior High tonight and win 66-0, and I don’t know what that does for us,” Sarkisian said. “Tonight we found out that we can, and we’ve been close, and we’ve been knocking on the door and I do think it’s helpful for us to play in a game like this before conference play against an elite opponent and come out on top. Surely that’s helpful for us moving forward from a mentality standpoint.”

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Texas QB Arch Manning celebrates after Hollywood Smothers scored the game-winning touchdown for the Longhorns. (David Buono/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

It was funny to hear Sarkisian admit that because, in that very same room almost 10 months ago, he was singing a much different tune. At 9-3 after the regular season last year, Sarkisian knew that Texas probably wouldn’t be in the CFP. So he cooked up a narrative that Texas should maybe consider canceling future non-conference games against real opponents because the Longhorns would have sailed into the postseason if they’d played a cupcake rather than taking the risk and losing to Ohio State, 14-7, in Week 1.

Now the shoe’s on the other foot and Ohio State’s margin for error is gone while Texas has banked a win that should give them a little breathing room if there are a couple slip-ups in SEC play. 

In the end, there is no way to engineer the perfect schedule. Just like Sarkisian’s fourth-down play calls, the entire sport is about taking calculated risks and accepting the consequences. 

But the Texas turnabout is really a matter of college football facing an existential choice. It can either live with very good teams missing the playoff on occasion because some of them will lose games like this, or it will choose a 24-team playoff that makes games like this relatively meaningless.

We know, of course, what most college coaches and administrators are going to choose. They want the expanded playoff access, they want the TV money, they want the job security of making the playoff every year. They want the belief their lives will be less stressful if they just deconstruct the essence of sport they spent a century building and shift the pressure toward December and January rather than a hot night in September. 

It’s a big bet. And the cost might be significant.

Because everything about the scene in Austin on Saturday was perfect — including the fact that every player on the field and every fan in attendance left the stadium knowing they had just been part of something with real meaning that will shape the next 10 weeks of the season.

“We just had to get something going. I always knew we would be in it in the end,” Manning said. “You dream of playing in games like this, hosting the No. 1 team in the country. How about that? Getting a win by one point? Let’s go baby!”

Everyone lucky enough to witness it should hold onto this feeling for a long time. Because if the CFP expands to 24 teams next year, it may be the last time something as dramatic ever happens in September. 

Part of what makes college football so intoxicating is the knowledge that, eventually, the cloud of smoke will lift and we’ll see everything clearly. To experience that before we even play the games won’t be nearly as fun.