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Tom Herman says he’s encouraged team to sing ‘The Eyes of Texas,’ school song has not divided Longhorns

Photos of quarterback Sam Ehlinger and a few coaches remaining on the field facing the Texas section after the OU loss apparently touched a raw nerve with fans.

As both a lightning rod and the University of Texas school song, “The Eyes of Texas” refuses to go away.

It’s become a big enough issue that football coach Tom Herman opened his Monday news conference after a gut-wrenching four-overtime loss to Oklahoma by addressing the flashpoint in a prepared statement. Normally, the OU postmortem commands all the attention, win or lose.

Not Monday.

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“I’ve encouraged our staff and team to join me in participating after games if they are comfortable doing that. I do believe it’s important that we acknowledge and thank our fans after a hard-fought game,” Herman said.

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“That said, some members of our program have concerns and aren’t comfortable participating at this time. I respect that as well. This is an issue we will continue to have meaningful conversations about and will work through.”

This summer, Texas football players and athletes in other sports sought major changes around campus, including changing the school song.

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While revered by many alums and fans, “The Eyes” has roots with minstrel shows and characters in blackface dating to the early 1900s. Many of the changes were implemented.

“The Eyes” stayed, although new UT President Jay Hartzell has formed a panel to look at the song, with a report due in January. Texas Heisman Trophy winners Earl Campbell and Ricky Williams have said the song should stay. More recent players have spoken of a special distaste for the song.

That doesn’t address the current situation. Beginning with the season opener against UTEP, players exited the field without singing or even acknowledging the song in front of fans.

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Photos of quarterback Sam Ehlinger and a few coaches remaining on the field facing the Texas section after the OU loss apparently touched a raw nerve with a fan base that is far from happy with a 2-2 start.

While fans may have very mixed views of “The Eyes,” Herman denied that the rift extended to the locker room. He pointed to fourth-quarter comebacks against Texas Tech, TCU and Oklahoma as evidence.

“A team that’s divided, a team that’s fractured, a team that has lost faith or hope, they don’t play like that,” Herman said. “All of us on this call have been around college football long enough to know that teams that play that hard with that much belief are teams that are together.”

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