Texas AD Chris Del Conte says AI didn't make the failed fourth-down call against Florida

Texas athletic director Chris Del Conte spent part of Friday explaining that a computer did not tell the Longhorns to go for it on the fourth-and-2 they failed to convert against Florida.

The Austin American-Statesman reported Friday that Del Conte pointed to that play as an example of the football team using Bevo Lab, the AI-driven analytics platform Texas announced the same day. Texas trailed 20-17 at the time. Arch Manning lost 3 yards, and the Longhorns went on to lose 27-24 last weekend.

Then came the cleanup. Bobby Burton of On Texas Football posted that Del Conte told him he had used the fourth down as an example of what the platform "could suggest, not what it actually did," according to ESPN.

So which is worse for a Texas fan: the AI calling the play that lost to Florida, or the athletic director using the play that lost to Florida as his sales pitch for the AI?

The platform itself is a big swing. Texas says Bevo Lab will cover all 21 sports and about 500 athletes, with about 40 student researchers working under Kirk Goldsberry, the former ESPN analyst and Spurs vice president for strategic research. The school is leaning on ties with Dell and Google Cloud. There is a "Bevo Lakehouse" data warehouse for game film and wearable data, starting with football, and a "transfer AI" system meant to help coaches with roster evaluation, scouting and game strategy.

"Bevo Lab will become the global benchmark for innovation in sports AI and data analytics, making Texas Athletics the most data-driven athletic program in the country," Del Conte said.

Goldsberry told the Houston Chronicle that Chris Bosh will be part of the lab's staff and that Kevin Durant will be more involved once he retires, ESPN reported.

The real test comes Saturday night. No. 19 Texas (4-2) hosts No. 7 Ole Miss (5-1) at 7:30 p.m. ET on ABC, and the Longhorns are 3-point favorites. If Texas faces another fourth-and-short, everyone in Austin will want to know who made the call.