Ohio State didn't lose this game in the fourth quarter so much as it lost the moment it treated a 20-point lead like a finished job.
No. 4 Texas beat No. 1 Ohio State 24-23 in Austin after the Buckeyes led 23-3 and looked like the best team in the country through three quarters. By the end of the night, they owned a stat no team ever had.
According to ESPN Research, AP No. 1 teams were 197-0 over the last 22 years when holding a 20-point lead in the fourth quarter. Ohio State made it 197-1, the first AP No. 1 since 2004 to lose after leading by at least 20 in the fourth. The Buckeyes walked into this game having won 115 straight when they led by 20 or more. Cut it another way and it's just as bad: this is the first time since at least 2003 that the No. 1 team led by 17 or more at halftime and still lost.
Ohio State piled up 240 yards to Texas' 97 while building a 20-3 first-half lead. Julian Sayin threw for 278 yards, and Jeremiah Smith had eight catches for 164 yards and a touchdown, the kind of night that usually ends with a trophy attached. At one point Smith had more receiving yards by himself than Texas had total offense.
Then the game turned into an autopsy. Smith didn't catch a single pass in the fourth quarter. Your best player, the one shredding a top-five defense, disappears from the plan exactly when you need him to bleed the clock and finish. Ryan Day didn't dodge it afterward. "Jeremiah played his heart out tonight, but we weren't efficient enough," Day said. "This one hurts. We had them on the ropes and didn't finish. Didn't play well enough in the fourth quarter, that's the bottom line."
He's right, though that's the polite version of it.
Texas scored 21 unanswered points in the fourth. Arch Manning started it with a touchdown pass to Ryan Wingo, and Hollywood Smothers punched in both Longhorns touchdowns in the rally. The door swung open when Connor Hawkins, who'd already made three field goals, missed from 45 yards, a kick that would have iced the game. Manning saw the opening too. "When that happened, I knew it was our time," he said.
Texas took over with 4:16 left, drove 71 yards on 12 plays, and reached the Ohio State 1-yard line after a 19-yard strike from Manning to Emmett Mosley V. The Buckeyes stopped Smothers twice at the goal line, including a review-confirmed stop on second down, and for a moment it looked like the defense might save the game. Then Smothers leapt over the pile on third-and-goal with 25 seconds left. Ohio State had no timeouts left, and a holding penalty on the first snap of the desperation drive ended it.
The coaching second-guess is fair, and Day handed it to reporters himself. He said the staff considered letting Texas score on second down to get the ball back with more time, then chose to try for a stop instead. "It didn't work out," he said.
Credit where it's due: Texas earned this one. It was the third meeting between these two teams in three seasons, and Ohio State had won the first two, including a 28-14 win in the 2024 College Football Playoff semifinal in Arlington and a 14-7 win in Columbus last year. Manning and Steve Sarkisian had been on the losing end both times. Not this time. Per Sportradar, Texas' 20-point fourth-quarter comeback is the largest ever against an AP No. 1 team, and per ESPN Research it's just the fifth 20-point comeback in Texas program history, the first since 2007.
Manning sounded entirely unbothered afterward. "It wasn't very pretty, but we found a way to win," he told ABC. "That's what good teams do." Sarkisian had said something similar before the game, talking about his aggression on fourth down: "No, that's a loser thing. Winners win, baby." Saturday night, the swagger held up.
Texas is 2-0 now and has a real case for No. 1 when the new poll drops. Ohio State is 1-1 with a loss that's going to follow it through the entire playoff conversation. There's time to fix things, and the Buckeyes are still loaded with talent. But you don't blow a 20-point fourth-quarter lead as the No. 1 team in the country without the questions landing on the head coach. Fair or not, that pressure is on Ryan Day now, and he built the platform for it himself.
The talent in Columbus was never the problem. The finishing was. In a season where every margin counts, Ohio State just gave away a lead that 197 previous No. 1 teams knew how to protect.
