Texas’ tumble from the top of college football gained steam Saturday with a stunning 27-24 upset at home to unranked Florida.
It was the second consecutive defeat for the No. 7 Longhorns (1-2 SEC, 4-2), who had ascended to the top of the AP Top 25 poll last month with a comeback win over Ohio State.
Quarterack Arch Manning was the star of that 21-point rally, but he was unable to mount another charge after the Gators went up by 10 points in the fourth quarter in Austin, Texas. Manning was sacked five times and fell to 0-2 in his career against Florida. His uncle Peyton was 0-3 against Florida in his college career as the Tennessee quaterback.
Manning completed 14 of 20 passes for 173 yards and a late touchdown to Cam Coleman, and Texas was held to under 300 yards of offense.
DE-FENSE 👏 👏
— Florida Gators Football (@GatorsFB) October 17, 2026
Myles Graham forced it. Kanye Clark recovered it. pic.twitter.com/DzOTNwMUZS
In control of its destiny only two weeks ago, Texas is teetering on the edge of missing the College Football Playoff for the second consecutive year.
“Extremely disappointed,” Texas coach Steve Sarkisian said. “We didn’t play very good football today outside of about the first quarter. Kinda bled out. They ended up controlling the ball in the second half. Our inability to be effective on first down and also our inability to convert in short-yardage situations, third and short, fourth and short, really was the snapshot of it all.
“Very disappointed. We’ll work and get back. We’ve got a better team than we are right now. It’s my job to get us to play closer to and ultimately to our potential.”
Sarkisian vowed that every facet of the team would be evaluated and didn’t rule out benching Manning.
Florida (3-2 SEC, 5-2) rallied from a 17-3 deficit and snapped a two-game losing streak following a 4-0 start and climbing to eighth in the rankings.
After beating Ole Miss last month, the Gators now have two wins over top-10 opponents and have sthis season.
Baugh player. 🤙 pic.twitter.com/votoHq56Qp
— Florida Gators Football (@GatorsFB) October 17, 2026
Florida was 0 for 7 on third down to start the game and then made five consecutive third-down conversions — the last a touchdown that tied the game at 17 with 6:50 left to play in the third quarter. The Gators then added a 28-yard field goal by Patrick Durkin and an 11-yard rushing TD by Jadan Baugh and hung on for the win.
“We played about as awful as we could in the first quarter, and we kept fighting,” Florida coach Jon Sumrall said. “We didn’t do that the last couple of weeks. When things got tough, we flinched the last couple of weeks. Our team grew today because we fought.”
In his first career start, Florida quarterback Tramell Jones Jr. replaced injured Aaron Philo and threw two touchdowns to Lacota Dippre.
“Started out a little slow, offense picked it up, and that’s how you finish a football game,” Jones said.
