NEW ORLEANS — The meeting of the two mascots proved to be an omen for the contest that soon followed.

Prior to the start of the 85th Annual AllState Sugar Bowl inside the Mercedes-Benz Superdome late Tuesday night, the mascots of the Texas Longhorns and Georgia Bulldogs met on the sidelines. 

The planned cutesy photo op in front of 70,000-plus fans didn’t go too well.

Bevo XV, the 1,600-pound steer, apparently didn’t care for the cute bulldog known as Uga X and nearly speared his fellow four-legged mascot. The animal handlers managed to step in and help avoid any mascot-on-mascot crime — the human Bulldogs though were not as fortunate as Georgia was dominated for the better part of three quarters in a 28-21 loss to Texas.

“Texas outplayed us, out competed us,” Georgia head coach Kirby Smart said. “They outcoached us. They did a lot of things better than us, and I think you give Tom (Herman) a lot of credit.”

Georgia, who a year ago was just seconds away from winning its first national title since 1980, arrived in New Orleans (the site of its last title game win) publicly pledging that they were focused on playing in the Sugar Bowl despite missing out on the College Football Playoff after a 35-28 loss to Alabama in the Southeastern Conference Championship Game. 

That bitterness of missing out on the playoffs was brought back up with a slew of Twitter trolling from Bulldog players over the weekend towards Notre Dame who got into the CFP over UGA was easily defeated by Clemson. 

Georgia though looked anything like a team focused on winning the Sugar Bowl against a fellow national blue blood — one who they hadn’t faced since the 1984 Cotton Bowl.

Smart though didn’t use missing out on the CFP as an excuse for his team’s lackluster performance — which was eerily reminiscent of the team’s last road trip to the state of Louisiana — a 36-16 defeat to LSU back on Oct. 13.

“We prepared for Texas for a long time,” Smart said. “That would be an easy excuse to use. I’m not touching that because it has nothing to do. We had an opponent to play, a good football team in which our team was focused on ready to play.”

Texas (10-4), who like Georgia lost its conference championship game as well, flexed its muscles right from the start as the Longhorns opened the game with a 10-play, 75-yard touchdown drive — capped by a touchdown run by a 2-yard run by quarterback Sam Ehlinger.

“Well, we pride ourselves in our physicality,” Texas head coach Tom Herman said. “At this point in our program, that is how we are going to win games. That is always how we are going to win games.”

After forcing Georgia to punt, Texas responded with a 37-yard field goal by Cameron Dicker and held a 10-0 lead.

In the second quarter, Texas extended its lead after Chris Nelson recovered a fumble by D’Andre Swift inside the red zone. Three plays later, Ehlinger found the end zone once more as he powered his way from nine yards out.

Ehlinger’s TD run was his 15th rushing score of the season and broke a tie with Vince Young and Donnie Wigginton for most rushing touchdowns in a season by a Longhorn quarterback.

“We didn’t contain,” Georgia defensive end Jonathan Ledbetter said. “We didn’t have a level pass rush most of the time. And we didn’t get him on the ground. When you don’t do that, he makes plays.”

Georgia (11-3) finally got its offense going in the second quarter.

The Bulldogs advanced into Longhorns territory for the first time with about 12 minutes remaining in the quarter and managed to put together a 12-play, 75-yard scoring drive capped with a 17-yard pass from Jake Fromm to Brian Herrin.

The Bulldogs though struggled to run the ball in the first half as the Longhorns’ defense bottled up the running back duo of Elijah Holyfield and Swift. The Georgia star backs combined for a mere 39 yards on 14 carries while the team had only 118 yards in the first half.

“They were physical up front,” said Fromm, who finished 20-of-34, 212 yards, 3 TD, 1 INT. “That’s one obstacle you have to climb over. And the next thing they were slanting this way and that way, shooting multiple gaps. And we just had a tough time trying to figure out which way they’re moving and trying to cut guys out of gaps. It was tough.”

Texas managed to tack on another Dicker field goal (30 yards) and entered halftime with a 20-7 advantage.

After a scoreless third quarter, Texas found pay dirt again with Ehlinger’s third touchdown run of the night which tied a Sugar Bowl record. Ehlinger was 19-of-27 for 169 yards while rushing for 64 yards and three scores to earn Sugar Bowl Offensive MVP honors.

“I think we all had a really good feeling,” said Ehlinger, who wore the high school jersey of New Orleans Saints’ very-own Drew Brees during the press conference. “We had a chip on our shoulder. Being the underdog, we knew all the pressure was on them. We came out and played loose, had fun. We played how we played all year and it paid off.”

Not even a pair of last-minute targeting calls or garbage-time touchdown passes from Fromm would stop the thousands of burnt orange faithful from chanting “OVERRATED” and the more mock-filled “S-E-C!”in the closing minutes.

That because when the scoreboard turned all zeroes Georgia had been dominated in nearly every facet of the game.

Physicality (10 less minutes in time of possession and 106 less rushing yards), execution (lost turnover margin 0-2 and 6-of-13 on third downs), celebrity star power (UT brought Matthew McConaughey and honor captain Ricky Williams), and oh yeah the actual game.

“Our number one goal coming to New Orleans to participate in Sugar Bowl was to win the game,” Herman said. “We weren’t just happy being here. We were going to win the game, and we were going to do everything that it took to win it.”

And it all started with Bevo having no time for a photo op with a certain pint-sized pup.