Although Texas just won the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl, it wasn't exactly their most impressive win of the year. They barely beat an 10th ranked Ohio State team 24-21 on this last minute TD from Colt McCoy to Quan Cosby:



While Texas had a very impressive season, many people thought they would (and should) beat Ohio State handily. After all, that's what fellow National Championship "snubs" USC did. They played the Buckeyes in an only slightly different situation. While USC played them without Chris "Beanie" Wells, Texas didn't have to deal with much of Beanie either. He ran well in the first half, but barely played in the second half with only 4 rushes for 10 yards. And in the second half, with Ohio State's best player barely seeing the field, Texas only outscored OSU 21-15. USC outscored them 14-0 in the second half, after jumping out to an early 21-3 first half lead.

Every since the BCS rankings put Oklahoma in the Big 12 Championship game, the Longhorns and their fans have been claiming that Texas was snubbed. Despite the fact that Oklahoma had a decisively more difficult schedule (and therefore a better resume), Texas fans continue to chant "45-35", which was the score on October 11, when the Longhorns beat Oklahoma in the Red River Rivalry game.

Did the Longhorns have a good enough season to warrant an appearance in the National Championship game? Nope. They were close, but not quite. While they might be able to make a case that they had a better year than Florida, there's really no reasonable argument that can put them ahead of Oklahoma (one game is not a reasonable argument), nor is there any way we could assume that they're better than USC, with the way they played Ohio State.

At best, the Longhorns can now be considered the #4 team in the country, behind USC, Utah and the winner of the National Championship game. Their close win over Ohio State shows that they aren't the elite team that they want everyone to think they are. While Ohio Sate is a very good team, they are NOT a National Championship contender, and that's what Texas made them look like.

After the game, Texas Coach Mack Brown had one thing to say about the rankings:


Don't kid yourself, Mack. The "best team in the country" would have beaten Ohio State by 4 TD's... like USC did. They wouldn't have beaten them by 3 points on a last minute touchdown. That's not what the best team in the country does.

After the game, Colt McCoy said "I don't think there's anybody in the country that can beat us at this point". That's another pretty bold (and delusional) statement, considering how close Ohio State came. It's been months since anyone considered Ohio State to be one of the best of the best, and they dominated Texas in the first half, beating them much worse than the 6-3 first half score indicated. Ohio State proved that although the didn't actually do it, they most certainly COULD beat Texas, right now.

Congratulations to the Texas Longhorns on a win in a very good bowl game, but Ohio State really didn't even deserve to be there, based on their regular season performance. They are now 0-3 against teams who made it to BCS bowls, and are not nearly as good as the Longhorns made them appear. While the cries of Texas fans that they had been snubbed my have held some weight at one point or another, their play in the Fiesta Bowl showed that they were exactly where they belonged: NOT in the National Championship game.