The 1982 Cotton Bowl Classic was the 46th

edition Edition may refer to: * Edition (book), a bibliographical term for a substantially similar set of copies * Edition (printmaking), a publishing term for a set print run * Edition (textual criticism), a particular version of a text * Edition Recor ...

of the college football

bowl game In North America, a bowl game is one of a number of post-season college football games that are primarily played by teams belonging to the NCAA's Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). For most of its history, the Division I Bowl Subdivi ...

, played at the Cotton Bowl in

Dallas Dallas () is the List of municipalities in Texas, third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of metropolitan statistical areas, fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 ...

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2020, it is the second-largest U.S. state by ...

, on Friday, January 1. Part of the 1981–82 bowl game season, it matched the third-ranked

Alabama Crimson Tide The Alabama Crimson Tide refers to the intercollegiate athletic varsity teams that represent the University of Alabama, located in Tuscaloosa. The Crimson Tide teams compete in the National Collegiate Athletic Association's Division I as a me ...

of the

Southeastern Conference The Southeastern Conference (SEC) is an American college athletic conference whose member institutions are located primarily in the South Central and Southeastern United States. Its fourteen members include the flagship public universities o ...

(SEC) and the #6

Texas Longhorns The Texas Longhorns are the athletic teams representing the University of Texas at Austin. The teams are sometimes referred to as the Horns and take their name from Longhorn cattle that were an important part of the development of Texas, and a ...

of the

Southwest Conference The Southwest Conference (SWC) was an NCAA Division I college athletic conference in the United States that existed from 1914 to 1996. Composed primarily of schools from Texas, at various times the conference included schools from Oklahoma ...

(SWC). Down by ten points, slight underdog Texas rallied in the fourth quarter to win, 14–12.

Teams

Both teams entered the matchup with identical 9–1–1 records.

Texas

The Longhorns were ranked #1 entering their fifth game of the season, but they lost to

Arkansas Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the South Central United States. It is bordered by Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, and Texas and Oklahoma to the west. Its name is from the O ...

, and a tie to

Houston Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 i ...

three weeks later knocked them out of serious championship contention.

Alabama

Alabama was co-champion of the Southeastern Conference who had been ranked #2 after their first game, but a loss to

Georgia Tech The Georgia Institute of Technology, commonly referred to as Georgia Tech or, in the state of Georgia, as Tech or The Institute, is a public research university and institute of technology in Atlanta, Georgia. Established in 1885, it is part of ...

and a tie four weeks later knocked them out of contention, though they won the SEC title due to them having a perfect SEC record along with

Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States Georgia may also refer to: Places Historical states and entities * Related to the ...

. Their win over Auburn the previous game gave Bryant his 315th win.

Game summary

Televised by

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...

, the game kicked off shortly after 1 p.m. CST, a half hour after the

Fiesta Bowl The Fiesta Bowl is an American college football bowl game played annually in the Phoenix metropolitan area. From its beginning in 1971 until 2006, the game was hosted at the Sun Devil Stadium in Tempe, Arizona. Since 2007, the game has been pla ...

started on

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters are l ...

. Trailing 10–0 in the fourth quarter, the Longhorns scored their first points with a quarterback draw by Robert Brewer on a third-and-long with 10:38 remaining. On Texas' next possession, Terry Orr scored from eight yards out to cap an eleven-play, eighty-yard drive to put the Longhorns up 14–10 with 2:05 remaining. Alabama's

Joey Jones Joseph Patrick Jones (born 4 March 1955) is a Welsh former international football full-back who most notably played for Liverpool, with whom he won two European Cups. Club career Wrexham Jones was born in Llandudno, and joined Wrexham in 19 ...

returned the ensuing kickoff to the Texas 38-yard line, and Alabama quarterback Walter Lewis took over with 1:54 left. On the very next play, UT's William Graham picked off a Lewis pass at the one. The Longhorns took a

safety Safety is the state of being "safe", the condition of being protected from harm or other danger. Safety can also refer to the control of recognized hazards in order to achieve an acceptable level of risk. Meanings There are two slightly dif ...

to insure better field position and make the final margin 14–12.

Scoring

First quarter :''No scoring'' Second quarter *Alabama -

Jesse Bendross Jesse Bendross (born July 19, 1962) is a former American football wide receiver. He played for the San Diego Chargers from 1984 to 1985 and for the Philadelphia Eagles The Philadelphia Eagles are a professional American football team based ...

6-yard pass from Walter Lewis (Peter Kim kick) Third quarter :''No scoring'' Fourth quarter *Alabama - Kim 24-yard field goal *Texas - Robert Brewer 30-yard run (

Raul Allegre Raul, Raúl and Raül are the Italian, Portuguese, Romanian, Spanish, Galician, Asturian, Basque, Aragonese, and Catalan forms of the Anglo-Germanic given name Ralph or Rudolph. They are cognates of the French Raoul. Raul, Raúl or Raül may r ...

kick) *Texas - Terry Orr 8-yard run (Allegre kick) *Alabama - Safety, punter

John Goodson John Warren Goodson (born March 18, 1960) is a former professional American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleve ...

downed ball in the end zone :

Statistics

: :

Aftermath

Texas climbed to second in the final AP poll, while Alabama fell to seventh.