Wouldn't It Be Sweet: What this 2019 Baylor team represents

Six months ago, this was not expected. Twelve days ago, it was reality. Five years later, Baylor fans and the football team are in a familiar position.

They woke up this morning knowing that in just a matter of hours they would watch or play a game at AT&T Stadium on Saturday to win a Big 12 Conference Championship. A victory would give them their third Big 12 Championship title since the inception of the league in 1996, tying Texas for the second most in league history behind only Oklahoma who has a staggering 12 to their name.

It would also be the third Big 12 Championship in the last seven seasons for the Bears. The Sooners have won the four since Baylor’s back-to-back title belt victories in 2013 and 2014. The two programs have combined to win at least 11 games eight times in those seven seasons with the Bears doing it three times and the Sooners five. The rest of the league has reached or surpassed the 11-win total just three times combined since 2013. 

But here we are, locally and nationally, not talking about how Baylor and Oklahoma have dominated the Big 12 over the last seven seasons and Baylor fans haven’t even thought once about it. Why? Because it’s fair and understandable. Baylor football has been on a three year hiatus from the national stage after the structure and foundation of its program was rocked by one of the most polarizing scandals in memory.

From 2010-2015, the Bears averaged 6.0 Big 12 victories per season, four times as many as the previous decade, but seemingly lost everything it had built in the blink of an eye in May of 2016. No one expected Baylor, a doormat program that averaged 1.5 Big 12 victories per season from 2000-2009, to ever be relevant again.

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The expectations from inside and outside were that the program would find it’s place deep in the depths of the conference as it was from for 15 years from 1995 until finally returning  to a bowl game in 2010. That became a reality for a short time to end 2016 through the entirety of the 2017 where the Bears won just twice in a 19 game stretch, once over Boise State and once over Kansas. 

Oh boy, were the expectations just as wrong to close the decade just as they were to open them. Baylor is now the winner of 13 of their last 14 games dating back to the final two games of 2018, and as noted, facing perennial Big 12 alpha in the Big 12 Championship on Saturday morning. 

Even with the 2-17 stretch during with interim head coach Jim Grobe and rebuild year from 2016-2017, Baylor finished tied with Kansas State at No. 3 in the league in conference winning percentage at 58.4%. The Bears fell behind Oklahoma (80.9%) and Oklahoma State (65.2%), but ahead of TCU (54.2%), Texas (52.8%) and the rest of the league.

But as good as of a decade as it is, this Baylor team, one picked sixth in the conference preseason only ahead of four teams going through head coaching changes, all but reflects (and has endured) the prosperity, the fall and the rebuild seen within the Baylor program right before their own eyes. Don’t let the hype and anticipation make you forget who this team is.

This team symbolizes the entire Baylor fan base; they symbolize you.

A team doubted to open the season that built daily and weekly towards a pinnacle only to fall, but at no point did they ever stop working, progressing and moving forward, earning their shot at redemption. 

A group of seniors who reached an agreement with University you call your own with great expectations for their careers and their programs only to see it crumble around them, but elected to stay loyal. A group of underclassmen that chose Baylor because of a vision and nothing more, like many of you. 

On and off the field they have restored a public perception that was shattered like glass, allowing you to wear your green and gold proudly once again. 

No matter the outcome on Saturday, what they have already done is more than good enough, but wouldn’t it be sweet...