What’s so special about Texas?

AUSTIN, Texas — The Longhorns like to say things stay the same day to day.

The same Texas football players also tend to say that this team is “special” beyond anything they’ve been a part of before.

“We’ve got something special going here,” junior wide receiver Collin Johnson said.

So, what is special about these Longhorns?

“Guys are already, from the first moment we get back, are looking for ways to be special,” senior offensive lineman Calvin Anderson said.

And what does special even mean?

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“It’s just a mentality. We’ve all come together and we’re closer than we’ve ever been,” junior Brandon Jones said. “That’s the biggest thing. As a defense, the closer you are the more you trust your guy to your right and left and play as one unit.”

How can this Texas team know this is special if things are always regular and routine?

Senior defensive lineman Chris Nelson, who perhaps embodies the way the Longhorns embrace working hard to have fun playing and winning, and letting the cycle begin all over again after every game, said it’s apparent to the whole team.

“Every Sunday we come in that locker room (the day after a game), you see nobody bragging, nobody talking about the plays they made, none of that,” Nelson said. “That’s the thing I love about it.”

The always thoughtful and insightful senior leader Charles Omenihu believes the earlier trials and tribulations — this year and the past several years — have something to do with the way this team carries itself from day to day, embracing being special without it going to their respective heads.

“You can taste failure more than the success,” the defensive lineman Omenihu said. “It’s an even better taste once you understand what failure tastes like.”

Ranked higher than they have been in ages, with attention pouring in from all corners and players collecting accolades week after week, Texas avoided talking about the future or admitting at first that this team was something different, instead focusing on the day by day, week by week approach.

As the wins over ranked teams collected, with a victory in hostile Manhattan, Kan. as well as a just-hang-on win over Baylor before the bye, the word special kept slipping out. And as the Horns head to Stillwater, Okla. to take on the Cowboys in another difficult road test, it’s especially important the team continues to embrace knowing it is special.

Just another test for this year’s Texas team, according to senior tight end Andrew Beck.

“It’s definitely going to be a test of our maturity,” Beck said.

“But I think the fact that everyone on our team is aware of that exact thing, that people in the building are concerned about how we’re going to be able handle the success. The understanding of that from guys in the building is kind of reassuring because if they know that it’s an issue that were kind of concerned about and we’re not just completely blind to it, it lets us know we’re aware of it.”

Having seen the highs and lows along with Omenihu from three years ago, Beck trusts this locker room to ensure the Horns play stays at a high level because of that special feeling.

“I think we have the guys that can handle this kind of situation and this kind of success that we’ve been having,” Beck said.

Reflecting on how this year’s Longhorns learned to balance between being special and staying humble, Johnson, who at times was up-and-down in the past, credited an approach from head coach Tom Herman that changed his and many others’ perspective.

“Coach Herman talks about it compartmentalize your life, and football is just another one of those things you’ve gotta compartmentalize,” the veteran wideout said. “ When people are talking very highly of you or the team, you have to put it in a box of its own and focus on getting better at practice when it’s time — having a real locked in mindset and trying to get better, and the rest will take care of itself in my opinion.”

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