Can Texas win the SEC championship in its first season? Examining the Longhorn's inaugural year in their new home

Texas will be transitioning to the Southeastern Conference ahead of the 2024 college football season. The Longhorns are set to realign with the landscape’s most dominant league, alongside their long-term rival Oklahoma.

This move is happening at a time when Texas finds its feet back in college football. The Longhorns won the Big 12 championship in 2023 and made it to the College Football Playoff, where they fell to Pac-12 champion Washington in the Sugar Bowl.

Steve Sarkisian's team looks like it will be continuing where it stopped last season. This raises the question of whether or not the Longhorns will hit the ground running immediately in the SEC.

Can Texas win the SEC championship in its first season?

There's a lot of hype around Texas ahead of their first season in the SEC. The Longhorns are joining the league as one of college football's most complete teams and obviously have a good chance to claim the conference championship in its very first season.

Without a doubt, the SEC is the most competitive conference in the college football landscape. The league boasts top teams that have done well lately, such as Alabama, Georgia, LSU, Ole Miss and a host of others. This signifies that Texas has a mountain to climb.

However, the Longhorns have shown how resilient they are as a team over the last year, and they will be bringing that to the SEC. The team notably defeated Alabama on the road in Week 2 of the previous season, and this will be a morale booster for them.

Taking a look at history, Texas has done pretty well against the current teams in the SEC. The Longhorns have an overall record of 191-94-9 against the programs in the conference. Notably, a total of 118 of those games were against in-state Texas A&M.

Steve Sarkisian's team notably has a better head-to-head against all but three SEC teams. These are South Carolina, Vanderbilt and Mississippi State. The Longhorns are tied 2-2 with the Bulldogs, while they are 1-0 against the Gamecocks and 3-8-1 against the Commodores.

It is also worth noting that Texas is the second favorite to win the SEC championship, according to the Sportsbooks odds. The Longhorns are +300 to win the conference title in 2024, only behind Georgia, who sit at +185.

Who are Texas’ biggest challengers in the SEC?

While Texas can assert itself as a dominant force immediately in the SEC, Georgia is their biggest challenge. The Bulldogs last lost a regular-season game two years ago and only missed out on the College Football Playoff after losing the SEC title game.

Alabama cannot be that underrated in the SEC, despite the exit of Nick Saban. The Crimson Tide will be under the leadership of Kalen DeBoer next season, and his record in college football has been amazing. The team can work a lot of magic next season.

Other top challengers in the SEC in 2024 are Ole Miss, LSU and Missouri. The likes of Texas A&M and newcomer Oklahoma could also pull some strings in the conference next season.