TCU Is Doing It Again

Mississippi State isn’t the only team who, in the words of Drake, “started from the bottom, now we here,” in the inaugural year of the College Football Playoff.

The new rankings were released by the committee last night, with many people likely expecting Alabama to move up into the top four after Auburn’s unexpected loss to Texas A&M.

But to the surprise of many and chagrin of Alabama fans everywhere, the football world saw a brand new face in the top four: TCU.

Less than a year after finishing 4-8, its worst mark under head coach Gary Patterson, the Horned Frogs have wasted no time taking back their place in the national championship discussion.

From 2001 to 2011, TCU quietly posted an astonishing 109-29 record, including a 77-13 mark from 2005 to 2011 in the Mountain West.

Patteron’s teams won seven bowl games and ten wins or more in eight of eleven seasons, which included top ten finishes in four different seasons.

It was quite an impressive run, though discounted by many due to the fact that the C-USA and Mountain West consisted of teams like San Diego State, UAB and Wyoming, to name a few. Nevertheless, the Horned Frogs completely dominated two average conferences for the better part of a decade.

Needless to say, after its announced conference change for the 2012 season, many wondered if TCU would be able to sustain its national relevancy once it moved to the Big 12.

At first, it didn’t seem as though they would be able to, putting together an unimpressive 7-6 record in 2012 and limping to a 4-8 mark last year.

It seemed as though a Power 5 conference was in fact too much to handle for a team used to playing the likes of Colorado State on a consistent basis.

So it should come as a surprise to no one that TCU wasn’t on the national radar coming into this season. All of the talk around the Big 12 was Oklahoma’s chance at the College Football Playoff, the rebuilding of Texas, and if Baylor could really challenge the Sooners.

No one was talking about TCU, but that didn’t matter. Gary Patterson and his team went about their business.

Despite being undefeated, the Horned Frogs still hadn’t broken the top 25 in week five. In week six, they finally got their foot in the door at number 25, sitting at 3-0.

And then week six, or Ragnarok, as I like to call it (extremely nerdy, I know, but the whole "death of major figures" thing conveys my point pretty well), happened, and chaos ensued. In a weekend crazier than any ever seen in college football, eleven teams from the top 25 lost, triggering an astronomical rise through the rankings for TCU.

Following an upset win over then fourth-ranked Oklahoma, the Horned Frogs rose from 25^th to ninth in the blink of an eye, and ever since that fateful weekend, they’ve been there for good.

Should we really be surprised?

I know they went from playing in conferences that closely resembled flag football leagues to a conference that will put you into a New Year’s Day bowl game, but they remained the same team.

Sure, it would take them a little while to catch up with the enhanced level of competition in the Big 12, but did everyone really expect them to take that big of a step back?

Right now, TCU is proving all of the doubters wrong in the way their fans always wished they would. They are winning big in Power 5 conference, and doing it in style.

They’ve taken down four top 25 teams (Oklahoma, West Virginia, Oklahoma State and Kansas State), narrowly lost a 61-58 shootout to third-ranked Baylor, and hung 82 points on Texas Tech.

The Horned Frogs average 47.2 points (good for third in the nation) and 550.3 total yards (fourth nationally) per game, led by quarterback Trevone Boykin, who leads the Big 12 in total yards per game with 359.7.

Gary Patterson has his team playing the best football they’ve played in his tenure at TCU, because he’s got his team playing nationally relevant football games in a nationally relevant conference.

That’s why they jumped Alabama into the top four of the College Football Playoff rankings. They have more quality wins in a season than they would have in five seasons in the Mountain West.

They have one of the leading offenses in the nation, and have proven their ability to win big games time and time again.

And they’ve been doing this for years; we just never noticed. Now they’re in the Big 12, and we have no choice but to pay attention to them.

Don’t be surprised if TCU makes a lot more noise before this season is over.