# Texas Vaults to No. 1 in AP Poll After Stunning 20-Point Comeback vs. Ohio State

Austin did not ask permission to rearrange the sport. It just did it in the fourth quarter, with 105,044 people watching a 20-point deficit turn into a one-point religion, and then waited for Sunday’s poll to catch up. Texas is No. 1 in the AP Top 25 — 56 first-place votes, 1,678 points, 2-0 — after a 24–23 comeback over Ohio State that felt less like a football game than a controlled demolition of every “it’s over” tweet written before the fourth.

The Coaches Poll followed the same script on September 13: Texas No. 1 with 42 first-place votes. The Longhorns did not tip-toe into the top spot. They stole it from a Buckeye team that had led 23–3 entering the final frame and left town as the highest-ranked one-loss team at No. 6.

## The night that broke the algorithm

For three quarters, Ohio State looked like the consensus No. 1 product it had been sold as. Then Texas ran three straight touchdown drives — 15 plays, 13 plays, 12 plays — and became, per ESPN Research, the first FBS team in 15 years to close a win with three consecutive scoring marches of 12-plus plays. Hollywood Smothers punched the winner from a yard out with 25 seconds left. The Buckeyes became the first AP No. 1 since 2004 to lose after holding a 20-point lead in the fourth quarter. Prior to Saturday, AP No. 1 teams were 197-0 in that spot dating to 2004. History did not blink. It just updated the spreadsheet in burnt orange.

Arch Manning finished 23-of-37 for 196 yards and a touchdown, including the early-fourth strike to Ryan Wingo that started the climb. He hit 11 of his last 15 when the game stopped being theoretical. He also ran when the pocket asked him to. This was not a tidy Heisman commercial. It was grit theater — the kind Steve Sarkisian later pinned on his quarterback’s refusal to let the night die.

“It was all emotion,” Manning said. “You dream of playing in games like this, hosting the No. 1 team at home. How about that, getting a win by one point? Let’s go, baby.” He also admitted the scar tissue from last year’s Ohio State loss: nightmares, unfinished business, the terror of walking into another home loss to the same rival with the same microphones waiting. The comeback was personal before it was historic.

## Sarkisian’s fourth-down theology

The rally did not happen because Texas suddenly discovered caution. It happened because Sarkisian kept going for it — including deep in his own end when polite football culture would have punted and prayed. Asked if he second-guessed the aggression, he offered the quote that will live on every Texas recruiting visit for a decade: that is how losers think. Winners win. They did not hire him to keep it close.

“His grit started it,” Sarkisian said of Manning — the quarterback deciding, essentially, to stop surviving and start making plays. The coach has had big moments in burnt orange. This one wore a different temperature: 20 points down to the No. 1 team in the country, a stadium refusing to leave, a back named Hollywood finishing what the fourth downs started.

Smothers’ two short plunges were the punctuation. The drives were the novel. Ohio State managed almost nothing after halftime in the ways that close games — a missed 45-yarder that could have iced a two-score lead among the dagger details — and Texas kept answering with length, not luck. Fifteen, thirteen, twelve. That is not a bounce. That is a philosophy surviving contact.

## Poll fallout: Oregon’s freefall, Michigan’s return

Sunday’s ballot was a crime scene with etiquette. Ohio State: No. 1 to No. 6. Oregon: No. 6 to No. 21 after losing to unranked Oklahoma State — a 15-spot freefall that still somehow found a floor because of the Ducks’ Week 1 win over Boise State. Oklahoma: No. 11 to No. 24 (−13) after falling to Michigan. Michigan: back in at No. 19, the Hail Mary hangover from Western Michigan rinsed by a ranked win.

The new Top 10 reads like a September power ranking that finally believes itself: Texas, Georgia, Notre Dame, Indiana, Miami, Ohio State, LSU, Ole Miss, Texas A&M, Alabama. First-place crumbs scattered to Georgia, Indiana, Miami, Notre Dame, LSU. The clear majority planted the flag in Austin. That is what a 20-point comeback against the defending vibe of the sport will buy you.

For Oregon and Oklahoma, the week is about damage control and schedule math. For Michigan, it is about whether voters can hold two thoughts at once: controversial Week 1 survival and legitimate Week 2 résumé repair. For Ohio State, it is the softest hard landing available — still Top 6, still dangerous, still one possession from rewriting the narrative in a potential rematch lane Sarkisian already needled Ryan Day about hoping to see again.

## Why this No. 1 feels different

Plenty of teams inherit the top spot because someone else lost. Texas seized it by doing the rarest thing available on a Saturday night: making an AP No. 1 look mortal in real time, then finishing the job with drive charts that look like endurance tests. Manning’s fourth career fourth-quarter comeback now has a signature. Sarkisian’s fourth-down swagger now has a receipt against the best available opponent. The crowd of 105,044 now has a night it will weaponize forever.

September No. 1 rankings are temporary by design. This one arrives with a built-in myth. You cannot soft-pedal a 23–3 deficit erased against Ohio State. You can only rank it, argue about the teams underneath it, and wait for the next stress test on Texas’s calendar — because Sarkisian already warned that one win is not worth four, five, or six when the rest of the slate is waiting with a crowbar.

## Sharp close

Texas did not climb. It vaulted — from No. 4 to No. 1 on the back of a comeback that broke a 22-year AP curse for teams holding 20-point fourth-quarter leads. Manning dreamed of the game, then won it by a point. Smothers wrote the final yard. Sarkisian refused to think like a punter. Ohio State dropped five spots and somehow still looks like a playoff problem. Oregon fell through the floor. Michigan snuck back in.

The poll is a photograph. The fourth quarter was a statement. In Austin on September 12, the statement was loud enough that September 13 had no choice but to type Texas at the top and hit publish.

---

**Photo slots**

- Hollywood Smothers game-winning 1-yard TD / celebration

- Arch Manning throwing or hyping crowd

- DKR stadium / 105,044 atmosphere

- Steve Sarkisian sideline / fourth-down call energy

- Final scoreboard 24–23

- AP Top 25 graphic Texas No. 1