DALLAS -- They don't always tell you about the outrageous expectations at Texas. They don't tell you that a program that hasn't made it past Oct. 1 undefeated since 1985 is expected to contend for the national championship every year.

They don't tell that, for all the hype and hoorah, the Longhorns haven't finished in the Top 10 since 1983.

Chris Simms is Texas' undisputed starter this season but faces some big expectations.(Allsport)

They don't have to tell you because sometimes it's all assumed if you commit to Texas.

Quarterback Chris Simms thought he knew everything about the school when he came to Austin two years ago. He broke a commitment to Tennessee in doing it, having fallen in love with everything about the program yet knowing little about its inner workings.

Going into last year's opener against Louisiana-Lafayette, Simms thought he had successfully worked his way through a preseason quarterback controversy to start the season for the first time in his career. Instead, he was on the bench after the first 15 minutes, his team down 10-0, having thrown an interception that was returned for a touchdown.

"It was hard, it was really tough on me," Simms said Friday at the Big 12 football media days. "I was heartbroken to tell you the truth."

For the most of the rest of the season, Phil Simms' son shared time with Major Applewhite. The quarterback controversy never died down, and there were those who wondered after two seasons if Simms would ever pan out.

Simms, the sophomore with little experience, was learning on the run. Applewhite, the veteran, had trouble running after fighting through a knee injury that had dropped him down a peg from being the Big 12 co-offensive player of the year in 1999.

Going into last season, it was Simms' time to shine. Going into the second quarter, Applewhite had to bail him out.

On the next series in that opener, offensive coordinator Greg Davis switched to the shotgun and began chucking it. Applewhite threw four touchdown passes, Simms mopped up, Texas won 52-10, and the situation was a mess.

And Mack Brown wouldn't have changed a thing.

"Major wasn't 100 percent and Chris was inexperienced," the Texas coach said. "If we lose to Louisiana-Lafayette, none of the rest of it matters, because I'm not there the next week.

"Major was as disappointed as Chris was that we took them out. I'm not into sitting there and making Chris happy. If he played well when he went in and hadn't thrown the interception for a touchdown, he wouldn't have come out."

This -- the brutal honesty of the game -- Simms was not prepared for. No matter how much adulation goes with being at Texas, sooner or later -- usually sooner -- you have to produce.

"I believe I can do it, but I have to prove it to other people," said Simms, the undisputed starter when Texas opens the season Sept. 1 against New Mexico State. "I realize that there are a lot of people out there who don't think I'm deserving of all the hype that I get. I'll be the first one to tell you I don't deserve it, either. There's no way I should be at the top of these lists."

This is still Texas, and despite Simms' sputtering start last season, one national magazine got caught up in the heady hype of a blond, talented, personable NFL progeny backed by all of six career starts.

Picking the Longhorns as the preseason No. 1 was questionable enough -- Texas hasn't won a title since 1970. It also picked Simms as the top Heisman candidate.

"It made me blush," Simms said. "It's something that I was little bit embarrassed about."

Notice to magazine editors: Simms still has potential unrealized. As he pointed out, Heisman campaigns are built on players who have done it "for one year, two years, maybe even three years."

So far, Simms has progressed steadily, throwing for 1,064 yards last year while leading the Big 12 in pass efficiency (144.25).

He played an effective game against Oregon in the Holiday Bowl, but the lasting image of that contest was Simms throwing four consecutive incompletions near the Ducks' end zone.

"It tore me up," he said of the 35-30 loss. "It's a game I feel that slipped away from us."

Both Texas and Simms must be better this season to satisfy the Orangebloods.

The urgency is not to gather magazine covers. A conference title would be nice, if not a national championship. The 'Horns arguably have the most talent in the league, but bitter rival Oklahoma has the ring.

And a 49-point victory over Texas last season.

"The thing that Oklahoma did for us it opened our eyes that we needed to work harder," Simms said. "The fans in our city are frothing at the mouth for a national championship."

Simms' situation is significant, because no matter what the outcome of this football drama, his success is linked to that of his coach. What they have done together is nice, but not great. Brown has embraced Texas tradition, if not a conference title trophy, winning nine games in each of his three seasons.

"This isn't a new scenario at Texas," Brown said. "My entire life, I wanted to coach at a school where winning was really important."

Simms grew up around the reporters' stupid questions, outrageous expectations and unending hype of New York. Heck, he practically grew up in NFL locker rooms with his father, a former New York Giants quarterback and current CBS analyst.

That's a lot of top-level game experience stored in Chris' head. What he didn't know was what it would be like as something less than the golden boy.

"It's torture standing on the sidelines," Simms said. "You want to be out there with your friends and teammates so badly. I had times where it was making me sick to my stomach. I wanted to cry almost, because I wanted to be out there. I love this game. To not be able to enjoy it week in and week out was tough."

Coming out of high school in Franklin Lakes, N.J., Chris was the best high school quarterback in the country. The last thing on his mind was playing for the Longhorns. But like thousands of folks from Darrell Royal to Ricky Williams, he fell for Texas.

"I just couldn't go to Tennessee and sit out a year and do nothing," said Simms, who would have had to defer to Tennessee's Tee Martin as a senior in 1999. "Every time I talked to my friends about recruiting visits, I was always bragging about Texas and what they had there and guys I met on the team and meeting Ricky. If I'm always talking about Texas, why am I not going to Texas? I fell in love with it."

Love and bowl games are two different things. Simms loves his school but has yet to win, or even start, a bowl game. At a place like Texas, that would be a good place to start.

"We still feel like we have the best quarterback situation in the country," Brown said. "Chris was a work in progress, having experience on the run is a difficult thing to do. But if you can't handle competition at the University of Texas, you sure don't need to be playing quarterback. If a guy can't handle heat, he probably came to the wrong place."