The Texas Longhorns gave a collective ho-hum Monday over their new role as No. 1.
"You can't get all big-headed," linebacker Sergio Kindle said.
While Texas earned its first regular-season No. 1 ranking since 1984 with a 45-35 win over Oklahoma, the Longhorns (6-0, 2-0 Big 12) say the more important numbers are 11, 8, 7 and 16, the rankings of four of their next five opponents in a murderous schedule. Lose any of those games and the stay on the mountain top will be a short one.
"We're right where we want to be. We're right where we expected to be," quarterback Colt McCoy said. "Now we've just got to continue to go play."
Even in an age of instant information at their fingertips on cell phones or home computers, several players said they didn't know they were No. 1 until coach Mack Brown told them Sunday, several hours after the rankings were released.
Brown put the The Associated Press Top 25 on an overhead projecter during a team meeting to let everyone see it at the same time. That too is business as usual. Brown tells the Longhorns where they're ranked every week.
"We were happy, but we also understood it doesn't mean much with seven weeks left to play," tailback Chris Ogbonnaya said.
The top ranking is important, however. It puts Texas in the drivers' seat to play for a second national championship since 2005 if they keep winning.
In 2005, the big win came in week two at Ohio State. Texas snapped a five-game losing streak to the Sooners but only faced two more ranked teams the rest of the season until beating No. 1 Southern Cal in the Rose Bowl.
This Texas team is just getting to the meat of its schedule. Texas plays at home Saturday night against No. 11 Missouri (5-1, 1-1), which was No. 3 last week until losing at home to No. 8 Oklahoma State. The Cowboys are next on the Longhorns' schedule.
Road trips to No. 7 Texas Tech and No. 16 Kansas round out the toughest stretch of games anybody in the country will play.
Brown has told his players over the years to avoid the "poison cheese" of listening to fans and media talk about how good they are.
Now that they're No. 1, Brown said he trusts team leaders such as McCoy and senior defensive linemen Brian Orakpo and Roy Miller to keep the Longhorns from taking a bite.
"If it had happened when we first got here, we would have hyperventilated," said Brown, who is in his 11th season with the Longhorns. "I don't think it will make any difference to this team."
The coach will also do his part to make sure of it.
"We're going to coach'em as hard as we've ever coached'em this week," Brown said.
If Missouri is hoping to catch the Longhorns in a letdown after a big win, the Longhorns are 10-0 under Brown the week after playing Oklahoma. The Tigers will be only the second ranked opponent in that stretch.
"I'll tell the guys to enjoy it," senior receiver Quan Cosby said of being No. 1. "(But) as quick as you can be No. 1 you can be number whatever."
