When you implement the offense that defined a generation of college football, and continues to do so even to this day, it’ll earn recognition.
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That’s what happened on Thursday when ESPN’s Bill Connelly labeled the 1968 Texas Longhorns as college football’s most influential team ever. The 1968 Longhorns, under legendary head coach Darrell Royal, earned that distinction because of the introduction and successful implementation of the wishbone offense that boosted Texas to 30 straight victories and two national titles in 1969 and 1970.
1968 Texas topped other well-known squads like 2010 TCU, 2013 Auburn, 2006 Boise State, 1984 BYU, 1971 Alabama, 1993 Florida, 2019 LSU, and 1924 Notre Dame.
Connally’s explanation for the Longhorns as the No. 1 team was as follows.
So many college football innovations have started far outside the mainstream, in places like Carlisle, Pennsylvania, or Mount Pleasant, Iowa. But one of the single most influential innovations of all time took place at one of college football’s power schools.
In essence, it doesn’t sound like much of a tweak. Tasked with modernizing a stale offense, new coordinator Emory Bellard — who, strangely enough, had been hired as the linebackers coach a year earlier — basically went back in time to install the Split-T option offense as a way of getting more from a loaded backfield. Only, he had the fullback line up closer to the quarterback as a faster way of either hitting the hole on the dive portion of the option or fulfilling his blocking assignments. But somehow that little tweak, which made the formation look like a wishbone (or, as writer Mickey Herskowitz called it at the time, “a pulley-bone on a chicken”), led to a revolution.
Having won just 20 games in the three previous seasons, Texas began 1968 with a tie against Houston and a loss to Texas Tech. But backup quarterback James Street looked good in a comeback attempt against Tech; he was named the starter the next week, and Texas wouldn’t lose again until 1971. They rolled through the rest of their 1968 slate, then went a perfect 11-0 in 1969, winning an all-time classic against Arkansas, then confirming a national title with a Cotton Bowl win over Notre Dame.
Because of Texas’ blueblood profile, the Wishbone didn’t have to work its way up from the lower levels of the sport. The other powers immediately understood that it could work for them. Alabama’s Bear Bryant quickly adopted it following the Longhorns’ 1969 success. So, too, did rival Oklahoma. And while the Horns would certainly reap the benefits of this offensive explosion — they enjoyed four top-five finishes from 1968 to 1972, then another top-10 finish before Royal’s retirement in 1976 — Bama and OU would dominate the decade, with five national titles and 16 combined top-five finishes from 1971 to 1980. Never has an innovation caught on so quickly, and for the success it brought both Texas and others, the team that perfected the ‘Bone should be considered the most influential team the sport has seen.
Thanks to a skilled quarterback in Street plus standout running backs Chris Gilbert, Steve Worster, and Ted Koy, the Longhorns averaged 332 rushing yards per game and 5.6 yards per play. The UT offense put up 34.3 points per game and averaged 448 yards per game on their way to a 9-1-1 record, a Southwest Conference co-championship, and a win in the Cotton Bowl over Tennessee.
The excellence continued in 1969 when Texas averaged 41.4 points, 363 rushing yards, and 427 total yards per game, including 5.8 per play. That per play average came while completing just 66 passes that season. The Longhorn offense ran through its schedule, including a win over No. 2 Arkansas and a Cotton Bowl victory over No. 9 Notre Dame, on its way to the program’s second national championship.
Royal and Bellard, who eventually became the head coach at Texas A&M, taught the system to other top programs, including rival Oklahoma and Alabama. Bellard taught Barry Switzer the ways of the wishbone, helping the Sooners win national titles in 1974 and 1975. Bear Bryant also utilized the offense to win national championships in 1973, 1978, and 1979 after his Crimson Tide swooned in the late 1960s. Including those numbers, the wishbone accounted for seven national championships in the 10 years following its introduction.
Other programs, including Bellard’s Texas A&M and even programs as far away as Pat Dye‘s Auburn, used the system into the 1980s.
Some programs took the wishbone into the 1990s, and even to this day there are teams that run a version or a variation of it in the 2020s.
While the wishbone was not the invention of the triple option, it carried triple option principles that permeate throughout college football, even in modern spread passing attacks.
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Because of its influence on football at the time and football today, plus the success the Longhorns found with the system not just in 1968, but in 1969, 1970, and up to the end of Royal’s time as head coach of the Longhorns, the 1968 Longhorns that implemented the wishbone offense were called the most influential college football team of all time.
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