Big Twelve Weekend Recap: Is Texas A Reflection Of The Conference Or Just A Team That's Struggling?

The Big Twelve is looking bad...its looking really bad. Kansas is looking like there's the potential to repeat their atrocious 2012 season, and Iowa State looks as if they're going to compete with the Jayhawks for the Big Twelve cellar. Then there's Texas, after all of the preseason accolades, the Longhorns look to be more of a fraud than ever before. Its one thing for the bottom of the conference to look bad (seriously, name a conference that doesn't have their own version of Kansas and Iowa St.) but when the self-proclaimed crown jewel of the Big Twelve is run off the field two weeks in a row then it brings the type of negative attention that no one really wants to see upon heaped upon them.

"Well, it looks like the Big Twelve is really down this season," is the phrase that I've heard uttered hundreds of times over the last couple of Saturdays and its directly related to the nose dive in Austin, Texas. Forget the fact that Texas hasn't been a player in the conference championship hunt since 2009 (That line has to sting a little bit for Longhorn fans to read.) its just the way people perceive the Big Twelve. They say that the squeakiest wheel is the one that gets greased, and the Longhorn football program has been greased by the national media, ESPN, their own network and many others based solely on the false claims of Mack Brown. That man could sell ice to Eskimos and he most likely has ESPN wondering just what in the world they've invested in. Its a losing proposition in Austin right now with basketball and baseball most likely to follow suit.

Does that mean the Big Twelve is down though? Not necessarily. The only thing that it really means is that Texas hasn't had any marked improvement since their initial nose dive of a season in 2010. The conference still has Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Baylor and Texas Tech in the Top 25 with the Sooners and Cowboys boasting of renewed defensive dominance and the Bears and Red Raiders putting up offensive numbers like they're playing video games. Who would have thought that a fourth of the way through the season the Longhorns would be lumped in the same conference category as Kansas and Iowa State? There's still time for Texas to turn things around but they're going to have to jump off the suck train first.

#24 TCU 10 - Texas Tech 20: With a combined five turnovers in the game, neither team looked overly impressive. Red Raider quarterback Baker Mayfield finally looked like a true freshman and TCU quarterback Trevone Boykin looked like a less secure version of the kid we saw in 2012. Regardless, the Red Raiders move on and remain of of the Big Twelve's unbeatens.

Tulsa 20 - #14 Oklahoma 51: Blake Bell set a school record with 413 yards in his debut and all seems to be well in Sooner Nation...for now. Oklahoma travels to Notre Dame in two weeks.

Georgia St 7 - West Virginia 41: Like Oklahoma, the Mountaineers made a switch at quarterback and produced their best offensive performance of the season. Ford Childress passed for 359 yards and three touchdowns in his WVU debut.

Iowa 27 - Iowa St 21: The Cyclones had absolutely no offense in the first half and a defense that couldn't make crucial stops in the second half. This could be the worst team Paul Rhodes has had at Iowa State.

Massachusetts 7 - Kansas State 37: Kansas State should be embarrassed that they had this game scheduled.

Lamar 3 - Oklahoma State 59: The only way the Cowboys can brag on this win is by saying, "At least we didn't play Massachusetts."

Kansas 14 - Rice 23: This is the game that started the Jayhawks 11-game losing streak last season. Now's the time to show us if you've improved Kansas. How will you rebound from this year's loss to Rice?

#25 Ole Miss 44 - Texas 23: A week after giving up 550 yards on the ground to BYU the Longhorns gave up just 459 total yards to the Rebels' offense. Hey, you gotta start somewhere. Look for the small victory, Texas, and claim it.