TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — Texas might not be all the way back after beating Alabama, but at the very least the Longhorns are on the come up.

That may or may not be a good thing for the SEC, even though the league figures to ultimately land a richer television contract with the addition of the Longhorns and Oklahoma Sooners in 2024.

This 2023 season, the final one with the SEC as we know it — East and West Divisions, 14 teams — might bring the end of the league’s string of four straight national titles.

Two-time defending national champ Georgia is ranked No. 1 and remains unscathed, a fortuitous schedule allowing the beat-up Bulldogs to by skate through slow starts and top significantly inferior opponents.

But other SEC teams thought to be contenders — LSU, Texas A&M and now Alabama — have suffered losses and are at best considered fringe Top 10 after just two weeks.

Texas’ re-emergence, in its final season in the Big 12, has come at the expense of a shaken Alabama football dynasty.

The Longhorns’ 34-24 upset of the Crimson Tide represents the most lopsided home loss in Nick Saban’s 17-year tenure in Tuscaloosa and snapped a 57-game non-conference, regular-season win streak that dated back to 2007.

Saban, a seven-time national champion, did his best to put the loss into perspective.

“I told the players early in the week that this was going to be a test, that we were playing a really good team and that we would find out where we were as a team,” Saban said in the postgame.

“It was a test for everybody. It was a test for the coaches, it was a test for me, it was a test for all the players, and we obviously didn’t do very well.

“But it’s the mid-term, it’s not the final.”

Perhaps not, but perception quickly overtakes reality in today’s 24-7 “now” society, and the SEC’s slogan of “It just means more” feels like it means less.

At the very least, the SEC’s early non-conference stumbles might come back to bite the league when the CFP committee doles out its four playoff spots.

Texas, meanwhile, can celebrate its biggest win since Vince Young and the Longhorns ended Pete Carroll’s USC football dynasty with a 41-38 win in the 2006 BCS Championship Game.

Texas’ recruiting, already red-hot with a No. 3-ranked class in 2023 featuring prized target Arch Manning, will surely spike on the heels of Saturday night’s marquee victory.

The Longhorns suddenly have something to build on after just one 10-win season the past 13 years, and that’s significant when it comes to establishing NIL sponsors and catching the attention of more national recruits.

Texas coach Steve Sarkisian moves to 15-12 in Austin and joins national championship coaches Jimbo Fisher and Kirby Smart as former Saban assistants to beat their former boss (3-28).

Fisher and his Aggies, however, are back on the ropes after a 48-33 upset loss. It was the seventh straight road loss and seventh setback in the past eight games against Power 5 competition.

Alabama, reputed to be a national championship contender, is suddenly on the cusp of what would be its third two-loss season in the last four years.

Tennessee and Ole Miss remain unbeaten but not without their struggles.

The Vols found themselves in a 6-6 slugfest with lowly Austin Peay with a minute left in the first half at Neyland Stadium before pulling away for a 30-13 win.

Tennessee, like Alabama, Georgia, Kentucky and Florida, is replacing a marquee player at the all-important quarterback position.

The Rebels, meanwhile, came from behind and needed four quarters to take control at Tulane in a 37-20 win.

It’s still early in the season, of course, and there’s plenty of time for the storyline to change.

But for now, the polls tell the story of public perception, and at the moment the SEC has the look of a league that has slipped.