Texas Football: Should Tom Herman be on hot seat following TCU loss?

Texas football head coach Tom Herman couldn’t stave off the upset this weekend, as the Longhorns were taken down by the TCU Horned Frogs.

Yet another disappointing loss for the Texas football program at the hands of stingy head coach Gary Patterson and the TCU Horned Frogs means more pressure on the shoulders of head coach Tom Herman. It’s not like the TCU bug is one that only Herman has dealt with among Texas head coaches. Texas had troubles with TCU dating back to the end of the tenure under former head coach Mack Brown.

And the Longhorns never got a single victory when Charlie Strong was at the helm either. Herman now holds a record of 1-3 against Patterson and the Horned Frogs. Texas as a whole is 2-7 against TCU since they joined the Big 12 back in 2012.

Although, this loss to the Horned Frogs hurt more than most. Last season, the Longhorns were technically upset by TCU on the road in Fort Worth. But this year, they really had the game in hand, and then junior running back Keaontay Ingram ironically both fumbled the ball and the game away at the same time.

Texas fell short to TCU in their Big 12 home opener at DKR on Oct. 3 by the final score of 33-29. That Ingram fumble cost the Longhorns their last chance to tie the game. A game that went back and forth largely in the second and third quarters did not fall in favor of the Longhorns in the end.

Where Texas football goes from here with Herman

Now that Texas owns a record of 2-1 (1-1 Big 12), they have really no margin for error through the rest of the conference slate. And the schedule gets pretty difficult really fast. Herman has to deal with what will likely be a very motivated Oklahoma Sooners team behind the direction of head coach Lincoln Riley.

Texas can’t lose to Oklahoma if they want to keep the Big 12 Title and College Football Playoff hopes alive. And even if they beat Oklahoma on Oct. 10, they have Charlie Brewer and the Baylor Bears and the Oklahoma State Cowboys on the road in their two games following.

This type of loss tends to be pretty common for Herman. Losing at home as a double-digit point favorite is not completely surprising to Longhorn football fans at this point of Herman’s tenure on the Forty Acres.

If Texas can somehow work through Baylor and the two Oklahoma schools, then they would work themselves firmly back atop the Big 12 standings and back in the College Football Playoff picture. But that idea is far fetched at this point since beating Oklahoma seems like a daunting enough challenge.

There were a lot of flaws in the Longhorns performance in this upset loss to TCU at home. Texas was penalized a dozen times for nearly 100 yards, and they lost the turnover battle. This could be some sort of a problem with the coordinators, but that is also a degree of fault to Herman.

Taking care of business against Oklahoma would be a big way for the Longhorns to bounce back, but that’s also a big thing to ask out of this team. Texas is likely to be a pretty big underdog in the Red River Rivalry game next weekend, depending on how the Oklahoma-Iowa State shakes out on the night of Oct. 3.