The UTSA Roadrunners were supposed to open their 2017 season with a home game against the Houston Cougars. The game never happened because of Hurricane Harvey. What if it had been played?
The What If Series: What If...An Earlier Debut | What If...A Different first coach | What If...The Saints come marching in and stay in SA | What If...A different Conference Realignment | What If...The Roadrunner QBs | What If...The Roadrunners in March | What If...The near misses | What If...Victories were actually defeats | What If...A different outcome in the New Mexico Bowl
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Leading up to the 2017 season there were high hopes for the UTSA Roadrunner football team. They were coming off of a 2016 season in which they went 6-6 during the regular season and earned a spot in a bowl game for the first time. The Roadrunners had lost that game but the fanbase spent the spring and summer of 2017 looking forward to the upcoming season.
A lot of the games were highly anticipated but none were as anticipated as the season opener against the Houston Cougars scheduled for September 2. The Cougars also had a fanbase with high hopes and for good reason. The 2016 Cougars had gone 9-3 in the regular season with wins over #3 Oklahoma in the season opener and #3 Louisville in November. Houston closed out 2016 with a loss in the Las Vegas Bowl to San Diego State on the same day UTSA lost the New Mexico Bowl. Houston did enter 2017 with a new head coach as Major Applewhite took over for Tom Herman who had gone up Highway 290 to coach a football team in Austin.
It would be the third time the Roadrunners and Cougars met on a football field. The road teams had won the first two meetings. Houston won 59-28 in the previous meeting at the Alamodome on September 28, 2013. That game had been a close game before the Cougars scored the final 28 points. UTSA returned the favor a year later on August 30, 2014 by beating the Cougars 27-7 in the inaugural game at Houston's new on-campus stadium.
So the stage was set for the rubber match to be played on September 2, 2017. It turned out Mother Nature had other plans. A week before the game was scheduled to be played Hurricane Harvey made landfall in Texas and tore a swath of flooding along the Gulf Coast. Houston alone was inundated with 51 inches of rain in the span of a few days. The UTSA-Houston game had to be postponed because the Cougar football team couldn't get their equipment from Houston to San Antonio. Eventually it would be cancelled. What if the game had been played? Could UTSA have beaten Houston in 2017? How might the season have turned out for UTSA if they had been able to beat Houston? How might it have turned out with a loss?
What does a game between UTSA and Houston look like?
If the game had gone on as scheduled, assuming Hurricane Harvey doesn't hit Houston, It likely would have been high on the list of attendance for UTSA games in the Alamodome. There would have been a lot of red in the crowd as Cougar fans would have no doubt made the trek west.
It would have been the head coaching debut of Major Applewhite with the Cougars (Because of Harvey his debut came a week later at Arizona). UTSA had just given Frank Wilson a contract extension about two weeks before the scheduled season opener.
UTSA's defense would have had to go up against a Cougar offense that were looking for a quarterback after the graduation of Greg Ward Jr. The 2017 Cougars had senior Kyle Postma, junior Kyle Allen and sophomore D'Eriq King to choose from. Houston also had a group of talented Running backs led by Duke Catalon.
Things might not have been much better for UTSA on offense going up against Houston.
The Cougar defense would have been more formidable in 2017 than they had been in 2014 or 2013. Sophomore Ed Oliver anchored the defensive line after earning first team All-American honors as a freshman in 2016. Houston also had former Roadrunner Austin Robinson in the defensive backfield.
Had UTSA and Houston squared off in 2017 the game likely would have been the most physical game of the year for UTSA. It would have been crucial for UTSA to not suffer any injuries in that game. If a player did get hurt and depending on who it was the rest of the 2017 season might have turned out very different.
What if UTSA beats Houston in 2017?
Because of the cancellation of the Houston game UTSA would only play 11 games in 2017. Their season opener came on September 9 when they beat Baylor 17-10 in Waco. The home opener ended up being against Southern on September 16. UTSA won that game also to start the season 2-0. By the end of September UTSA was 3-0 with a win over Texas State.
If UTSA had been able to play and beat Houston there is every likelihood that the Roadrunners start 2017 with a 4-0 record. The momentum gained from beating a Houston team that was coming off a nine-win season could have maintained the Roadrunners for weeks. It would have been the second time UTSA started a season 4-0 since 2012.
Their fifth and sixth games of 2017 were decided by a grand total of five points. After those two losses UTSA won their next two which in this case would have pushed their record to 6-2 on the season. Even if they go 1-3 in the final four games as happened in real life (two of those losses by single digits) they would have been going to a bowl game with a 7-5 record.
Of course if they beat Houston and start 4-0 who is to say they don't also beat Southern Miss and the miracle in Denton goes in favor of UTSA. Wins over Rice and UTEP in the following week puts UTSA atop the west division standings at 8-0 heading into November 2017. Even in this scenario I can't see them beating Louisiana Tech in Ruston which would have decided the division in the final game of the regular season so UTSA would finish 2017 anywhere from 11-1 to 9-3 depending on how November goes.
The 2017 Roadrunners almost certainly would have gone bowling with a win over Houston, perhaps to the Heart of Dallas Bowl or some other exotic locale. If that happened Frank Wilson would have been a hot commodity heading into 2018 if not outright plucked by a higher profile job.
What if Houston beats UTSA?
Despite not playing UTSA in 2017 the Houston Cougars ended up going 7-4 during the regular season and losing the Hawaii bowl to Fresno State. Houston opened their season 2-0 with wins over Arizona and Rice before losing to Texas Tech in the third game.
If the Cougars have a win over UTSA under their belt they start 2017 3-0 and finish 8-4. UTSA on the other hand goes into their road trip to Baylor coming off of a defeat. Depending on whether it is a blowout loss like 2013 or a close loss there will be carry over to the next week at Waco. Baylor turned out to be abysmally bad in 2017 but if the Roadrunners go in with their confidence broken it could mean an 0-2 start. Assuming the rest of the season goes the way it did UTSA would have finished 5-7.
Say UTSA lost to Houston in a close game then its possible the Roadrunners still beat Baylor and start their 2017 season 3-1. Keeping the rest of the results the same UTSA is looking at a 6-6 record which still might not be good enough when there were more teams with bowl eligibility than bowl slots in 2017.
The Roadrunners 1-3 finish to 2017 was a sign of the seasons to come. If they had lost to Houston and go into November with a 6-2 record or a 5-3 record there might have been more pressure on the team to try and make a second bowl game. As it was the cancelled game hovered over the team as it remained neither a win or a loss in their back pocket.
Where is UTSA football today if they had played Houston?
If UTSA and Houston had played each other on September 2 it would have changed the path of the Roadrunner program.
A win over Houston could have been a springboard to a better record in 2017 than was actually attained. It also likely would have sent UTSA to a second bowl game in a row. A 7-5 record or higher with bowl trip in 2017 would have possibly had many schools calling Frank Wilson about moving on.
On the other hand a loss to the Cougars could have slowed the progress of the Roadrunners that they seemed to be gaining after the 2016 season. A loss would have also dampened the spirits of the Roadrunner fans. Depending on how the rest of 2017 plays out and if the loss has any effects on the results of other games the fanbase might have turned on the coaches earlier than the 2018 season.
There is one certainty about the what if of UTSA playing Houston in 2017: It would have been one heck of a football game. If only there hadn't been a hurricane over Houston.
NEXT WEEK: What If...the Rivalry Games Part 1
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