No. 4 Texas scores 21 unanswered in fourth quarter to beat No. 1 Ohio State 24-23

Will Texas be the new No. 1 team in the country?

The No. 4 Longhorns scored 21 straight points in the fourth quarter to get a 24-23 win over No. 1 Ohio State on Saturday night. Hollywood Smothers dove over the pile at the goal line with 25 seconds to go to tie the game ahead of Gianni Spetic's go-ahead extra point.

After trailing by 23-3 early in the fourth quarter, Texas was in front.

Ohio State didn't have any timeouts after Texas' touchdown, and any hope of a miracle game-winning drive ended with a holding penalty on the first play.

"It wasn't very pretty, but we found a way to win," Arch Manning told ABC after the game. "That's what good teams do."

The Buckeyes' loss is the first time since at least 2003 that the No. 1 team in the AP Top 25 led by 17 or more points at halftime and ended up losing the game.

With a defense that clearly started leaking oil in the second half, one question will be on Ohio State fans' minds this week. Should the Buckeyes have let Texas score earlier?

Texas took over with 4:16 to go after a missed 45-yard field goal by Ohio State's Connor Hawkins. Had the kick gone in, Ohio State would have been up two scores.

Instead, Texas embarked on a 12-play drive that went 71 yards. And it took a while to get that final yard. The Longhorns got to the Ohio State 1-yard line with 1:23 to go after a 19-yard completion from Manning to Emmett Mosley V.

At that point, Ohio State had one timeout after using its second before the completion. Should Ryan Day have saved it?

Day elected to take that timeout before second down, after his defense stopped Smothers short of the end zone. After the timeout, there were 51 seconds on the clock.

The Buckeyes then stopped Smothers again on second down, though the play necessitated a replay review. The review confirmed that Smothers didn't get into the end zone. That allowed Texas to take even more time off the clock before snapping the ball on the third-down play Smothers got into the end zone on.

Of course, it was not a guarantee that Texas would have gotten into the end zone. But it was also highly probable. Had Ohio State put up less resistance on first down, the Buckeyes would have had over a minute remaining and a timeout in their pocket for an attempt at a game-winning drive.

On a day where the high hit 100 degrees, Texas ended up running 78 offensive plays. And more than half of them came over the final 21 minutes of the game

The Longhorns ran 40 plays across their final three possessions. And all three of those drives ended in touchdowns.

Texas cut the lead to 13 with a 15-play, 91-yard drive that ended with a TD pass to Ryan Wingo with 14:19 to go. After Ohio State went three-and-out, the Longhorns then ran 13 plays that covered 72 yards before Smothers scored his first touchdown of the game.

The Longhorns also converted fourth downs on each of those first two touchdown drives.

It was quite the contrast from Texas' first two drives of the games. Smothers fumbled on the first offensive play of the game after taking a swing pass from Manning. After Ohio State kicked a field goal, Manning had Cam Coleman wide open for a deep completion.

But the pass was just too far ahead of Coleman, who had to dive to make the catch. As Coleman brought the ball into his body, it bounced out of his grasp when he hit the ground and flew into the air for a Jaylen McClain interception .

Manning finished the game 23-of-37 passing for 196 yards and a TD along with the interception. After the run game was stuffed for most of the evening, Smothers ended up with 21 carries for 74 yards and two scores, while Raleek Brown had 10 carries for 54 yards.

Had Ohio State hung on for what looked like a convincing win in the third quarter, Jeremiah Smith's play would have been the takeaway. The star junior wide receiver had eight catches for 164 yards and a touchdown that put the Buckeyes up 17 with just 10 seconds to go before halftime.

As Ohio State's offense slowed down in the second half, Smith's production did too. Ohio State had just five first downs over the final 30 minutes of the game and ran 28 plays to Texas' 47 in the final half.

Ohio State QB Julian Sayin was 17-of-32 passing for 278 yards, a TD and an interception. No other Buckeyes player than Smith had more than four catches or 37 receiving yards.