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In college football showdown, Texas will try beating Georgia at its own game

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In college football showdown, Texas will try beating Georgia at its own game


For more than a decade, as Texas flirted with returning to its former status as one of college football’s elite programs, it was one of the most popular questions in the sport.

Are the Longhorns finally back? For just as long, the answer stayed the same: No.

That changed in 2023, when Texas went 12-2 in coach Steve Sarkisian’s third season and appeared in the College Football Playoff for the first time. Few, this season, are still questioning the top-ranked Longhorns (6-0). 

Even when starting quarterback Quinn Ewers was injured and missed two games, Texas was able to insert backup quarterback Arch Manning, the former top recruit in the country in 2023 whose uncles, Peyton and Eli Manning, combined to win four Super Bowl titles. 

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Yet the Longhorns will face their toughest challenge thus far Saturday when they host No. 5 Georgia (5-1). And it’s appropriate that Texas’s “Welcome to the SEC” moment should come against the Bulldogs, the program whose path to the top the Longhorns are trying to mimic. 

Like Texas, Georgia spent much of the last 30 years boasting a past national championship and a campus in a recruiting-rich part of the country, with little modern success to show for it. Under coach Kirby Smart, a former defensive coordinator who learned under Nick Saban at Alabama, the Bulldogs super-charged their recruiting; in the nine years since Smart’s hire, they have finished with the top-ranked class three times and been ranked lower than fourth just once. 

In 2022, the same season in which Georgia won a second consecutive national championship, the university spent $4.5 million on football recruiting, most in the country, according to USA Today. The quarterback of the Bulldogs’ back-to-back championship teams was not a former high-star recruit, but he did grow up in Georgia.

When Texas sought a head-coaching change in 2020, it also turned to a former Saban coordinator, Sarkisian, and showered the program with money to find the best players possible, spending $2.4 million on its 2022 recruiting budget. In the decade before Sarkisian’s hiring, Texas recruiting classes finished with an average rank of 10.8 in the country; in three recruiting classes under Sarkisian, Texas has averaged a ranking of 4.6. And the offense full of misdirection and motions is now run by a homegrown Texan — Ewers. 

In the eyes of Texas fans, the Longhorns won’t qualify as fully back until they win the program’s first football national championship since 2006. Though Texas officially played its first Southeastern Conference game Sept. 28, beating lowly Mississippi State, its first measuring-stick game as a member of the SEC arrives Saturday in the form of Georgia, the program whose turnaround from a historic great to a present power it aspires to model. 

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By one metric, the Longhorns may be a step ahead. For the first time since 2021, bettors view Georgia as an underdog. 



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North Texas couple, former Godley officers under investigation in alleged prostitution scheme

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North Texas couple, former Godley officers under investigation in alleged prostitution scheme


Prosecutors say a North Texas couple and several former members of the Godley Police Department are under investigation following a search of the couple’s home last week. Investigators report finding a device containing evidence of a five‑year prostitution conspiracy and say the couple worked with the city’s former police chief — who has also been arrested — along with other officers. Authorities also allege the group gathered intelligence on people they viewed as enemies, including members of the Godley City Council.



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Opal Lee’s granddaughter advocates for “Grandmother of Juneteenth” to be included in Texas curriculum

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Opal Lee’s granddaughter advocates for “Grandmother of Juneteenth” to be included in Texas curriculum



The granddaughter of Dr. Opal Lee, famously known as the “Grandmother of Juneteenth” was in Austin Tuesday to advocate for the inclusion her grandmother in Texas’ Juneteenth curriculum. 

Dr. Lee is nearly 100 years old and lives in Fort Worth. She received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2024 and was by President Biden’s side when he made Juneteenth a federal holiday in 2021. 

“I want to petition for her to be a required person to study Juneteenth,” said granddaughter Dione Sims. “People that have to do with freedom, liberty, and unity; she’s the embodiment of that. Helping to get Juneteenth as a national holiday, I think deserves to be mentioned.” 

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Sims testified in front of the State Board of Education Tuesday night. A final decision is expected in June.

Lee, born in 1926, played a crucial role in making Juneteenth a federal holiday. The North Texas icon walked two and a half miles every Juneteenth to symbolize the two and a half years it took for enslaved people in Texas to learn they were free, after the Emancipation Proclamation. In 2016, she walked from Fort Worth to Washington, D.C., to raise awareness.

She didn’t participate in the 2025 walk after being hospitalized.

Lee has also been honored with a Barbie doll that celebrates her advocacy as part of its Inspiring Women collection.

Sims previously discussed expanding Lee’s walk across all 50 states, preserving her grandmother’s legacy with a walk in one city in each state.

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North Texas Iranian Americans fear for families amid Trump’s threats against Iran

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North Texas Iranian Americans fear for families amid Trump’s threats against Iran


Tensions are rising between the United States and Iran, as a deadline from President Donald Trump fuels concerns about potential military action.

Just hours before President Trump’s deadline for Iran to accept a deal or face military consequences, Iranian Americans in North Texas feared for their relatives on the ground, saying the focus should stay on the people of Iran.

“We’re in a wartime, so everyone’s worried and following the news,” said Homeira Hesami, the chairwoman for the Iranian American Community of North Texas. “The internet’s still being down, you know, we don’t have a very secure way to communicate with our family and friends back home, so sometimes, you know, they may be able to call out, but it’s very patchy.”

Tuesday, Mr. Trump posted on Truth Social that “a whole civilization will die tonight” if Iran does not open the Strait of Hormuz,  following similar threats he made on Easter Sunday. TCU Political Science Professor Ralph Carter offered this perspective on the potential loss of life.

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“In the worst-case scenario, President Trump carries out massive attacks against civilian targets, killing thousands or even millions of people, then I think Congress has to act,” said Carter.

Carter added that targeting an entire civilization could amount to a war crime and raises serious questions about Mr. Trump’s legal authority. He said this also shakes up the U.S.’s relationships with its allies.

“I do think that Iran will survive, whatever happens,” Carter said. “I think the Iranian people will be united in a rally around the flag phenomenon to defend their homeland against an aggressor, and I think, again, this is one of those things where a weaker power outlasts a stronger power, because the stronger power gets tired of the price they have to pay to try to get a victory.”

Hesami believes change in Iran must come from the Iranian people, not through foreign intervention.

“War has proven that sometimes it is not the solution, and the solution is relying on the Iranian people and their organized resistance,” she said.

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Less than two hours before his deadline for Iran to either cut a deal with the U.S. or face massive strikes on its power plants, Mr. Trump said he agreed to a “double sided CEASEFIRE” with Iran.

“I agree to suspend the bombing and attack of Iran for a period of two weeks,” the president wrote on Truth Social.

He said the ceasefire, which he agreed to at Pakistan’s request, was “subject to the Islamic Republic of Iran agreeing to the COMPLETE, IMMEDIATE, and SAFE OPENING of the Strait of Hormuz.”



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