Make that two Longhorn golfers ESPN has hooked to appear on its popular college football pre-game show College GameDay this season.
While Scottie Scheffler didn’t get to make picks with Desmond Howard, Kirk Herbstreit and the gang when the traveling show came to Austin for the Texas-Alabama game — we think he was perfectly satisfied with receiving his PGA Tour Player of the Year award, though — fellow Longhorn Jordan Spieth put his college football knowledge to the test as GameDay’s guest picker this week. The show made a rare second visit to Austin this season for Texas’ game against undefeated TCU.
Top Gun: Maverick actor Glen Powell was the celebrity guest picker in Week 2 and went an impressive 8-4 with his picks, giving Spieth a high bar to clear.
Scottie Scheffler named PGA Tour Player of Year — on College GameDay
Scheffler was unavailable to be the guest picker this week as he is in the field at the Cadence Bank Houston Open, less than three hours down the road in Houston.
However, Spieth is no backup get. He may have turned pro midway through his sophomore year in Austin, but he led the Longhorns to an NCAA Championship during his freshman year in 2012.
Spieth said on the show that Saturday is his brother-in-law’s wedding, which could be a reason he’s missing the event he’s played seven times in his career, but just once since it moved to the fall portion of the schedule. He presumably hopped on a plane to New Orleans after his appearance to make it in time for the wedding.
We can only hope the ceremony is wrapped up in time for him to catch at least some of the Longhorns game which kicks off at 7:30 p.m.
Spieth is the first golfer to appear on the show as guest picker since Georgia alumnus Harris English went on shortly after the Ryder Cup last year for the Bulldog’s game against Arkansas. In November 2020, the show aired from Augusta National during the fall Masters and had Ohio State alumnus Jack Nicklaus as guest picker.
Spieth played his part with his picks, selecting the No. 18 Longhorns to upset the fourth-ranked Hornfrogs by “10 to 15.” Here are the rest of his picks:
Florida State – Syracuse: FSU (FSU won 38-3)
Louisville – Clemson: Clemson (Clemson won 31-16)
North Carolina – Wake Forest: UNC (UNC won 36-34)
Central Florida – Tulane: Tulane* (UCF won 38-31)
Purdue – Illinois: Illinois (Purdue won 31-24)
Washington – Oregon: Washington (Washington won 37-34)
Kansas State – Baylor: K-State (K-State won 31-3)
Alabama – Ole Miss: Alabama (Alabama won 30-24)
LSU – Arkansas: Arkansas (LSU won 13-10)
TCU – Texas: Texas (TCU won 17-10)