​Texas Longhorns quarterback Arch Manning (16) runs the ball in the third quarter of the Longhorns’ game against the UTSA Roadrunners at Royal-Memorial Stadium in Austin, Sept. 19, 2026. (Sara Diggins/Austin American-Statesman)
In any other era, Oklahoma’s motivation this weekend at the State Fair in Dallas would have been simple.Ruin Texas’ season.There was a time, covering a century or so of college football history, when stuff like that was possible. An underachieving team could walk into the Cotton Bowl on the second weekend of October and massacre the dreams of a good one, and then two rivals could spend the next couple of months being miserable together.But that won’t happen Saturday. It can’t anymore. And it’s not because the unranked Sooners aren’t capable of beating the No. 1 team in the country. The Longhorns might lose the game. It’s just that in the age of a 12-team playoff, there’s little danger of them losing any more than that.The stakes of early-autumn clashes aren’t what they used to be, and that’s true of rivalries without the words “Red River” in their nicknames. On the same day as OU and UT meet in Dallas, for instance, two of the most accomplished programs of the past two decades are set to meet in a huge showdown in Alabama, weather permitting.And if the No. 6 Crimson Tide beat No. 2 Georgia, what will that get them in December? Maybe a first-round bye. Then again, the Bulldogs might lose Saturday and wind up with one of those, anyway.This is part of the tradeoff that came with expanding the postseason, and if certain folks get their way, it’s going to become even more pronounced in years to come. As of Thursday afternoon, the College Football Playoff and ESPN were still in a 30-day negotiating window in which both sides were considering a 24-team format starting next year. That negotiating window is set to expire Friday. And if those in charge do elect to double the current playoff field, either next season or beyond?There will be two ways to look at it. On one hand, those mid-November matchups between three-loss Missouri and three-loss Texas A&M (or, possibly, between one-loss UTSA and one-loss North Texas) will mean more than they used to.On the other, games like Texas-Oklahoma and Georgia-Alabama mean less than ever.
Texas running back Ryan Niblett (21) and Texas wide receiver Kohen Brown (13) celebrate after a kick return during the game against UTSA at Darrell K Royal?Texas Memorial Stadium on Saturday, Sep. 19, 2026 in Austin. (Aaron E. Martinez/Austin American-Statesman)
This isn’t to say they wouldn’t mean anything at all, or that they wouldn’t still be special. After all, people still enjoy watching the Seahawks play the Patriots and the Chiefs play the Bills during the NFL regular season, and none of those singular games have the ability to make or break a team’s championship hopes.But the magnitude of mid-October (and of late September, and of early November, and of every week in the regular season)