 With many of their starters returning, a highly ranked recruiting class, and a number one ranking before the season, the team had high expectations of repeating as national champions as they had nearly all of their offensive starters returning, although they had only two returning defensive starters from the previous year.The team went undefeated in the regular season with nine of their twelve wins by 17 points or more and were compared with the greatest teams in the history of college football.Once again ranked first in the Bowl Championship Series (BCS) rankings, they were invited to the national championship bowl game at the Rose Bowl, where they lost to the Texas Longhorns.