Damien Harris explains why he doesn’t expect Texas to make College Football Playoff
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Damien Harris knows what championship football looks like at the collegiate level, having helped Alabama win national titles in 2015 and 2017.
He was an All-SEC running back for the Crimson Tide, so he was integral part of both of those championship runs. Now, Harris is a college football analyst for CBS Sports, so he looks at the game from a different perspective. And from his view of things right now early this season, Harris doesn’t believe Arch Manning and Texas are destined to play for a national championship in 2025.
That might seem like jumping the gun, since it’s only Week 4 and Texas only has that 1 loss, a Week 1 clunker at Ohio State. The 8th-ranked Longhorns have followed with 2 relatively easy victories and on Saturday night seem poised to get to 3-1 with a home game against Sam Houston (8 p.m. ET, ESPN+).
So, why is Harris already giving up on Texas in 2025? He was asked point blank if he believes the Longhorns have a shot to make the College Football Playoff.
“Nope. Sure don’t,” Harris said. “We have spent so much time dissecting Arch Manning and what’s wrong with him that we’re not even looking at the other problems this Texas offense has. What about the fact that they still can’t protect. They cannot run the football to save their lives. Arch Manning right now is the leading rusher.
“What’s going on? The most important stat for an offense is no explosive plays for this Texas offense. Only 4 explosive passes all season long. We spend a lot of time talking about Arch Manning and him not playing up to the standard, but we need to identify that this Texas offense has much bigger problems.”
Here is the full clip from CBS Sports:
Time will tell if Harris was indeed jumping the gun on Texas or if he was right on the money, even in mid-September.
Cory Nightingale, a former sportswriter and sports editor at the Miami Herald and Palm Beach Post, is a South Florida-based freelance writer who covers Alabama for SaturdayDownSouth.com.
