U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz smirks from the stage at a speaking event. Credit: Wikimedia Commons / Gage Skidmore

Houston Cougar fans are blaming U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz’s attendance at the NCAA Men’s Final Four Championship game at the Alamodome for their team’s stunning collapse against the University of Florida Gators.

Despite being up by 10 points in the second half of Monday’s game, the Cougars’ lead over the Gators vanished after the Houston Chronicle posted an article confirming that Cruz watching from (Gasp!) inside the building.

Texas politics reporter Scott Braddock later confirmed the sighting on social media platform X.

The Cougars would end up losing 65-63 to the Gators in the game’s dispiriting final seconds.

Texas sports fans have long speculated that when Cruz attends a game for a Texas sports team, the team he’s rooting for goes down the tubes.

And there’s data to back up the theory.

Since 2017, sports bettors are 18-2 when betting the moneyline against the team Ted Cruz is there to support in person, according to data collected by the @CFBHome X account.

The last time the Cruz curse allegedly struck was in October when the Texas Longhorns football team lost 30-15 against the University of Georgia Bulldogs in Austin.

Cruz was also blamed for the Houston Astros’ ALDS loss against the Detroit Tigers last season.

Despite some pretty convincing numbers and petitions calling for Cruz to be banned from certain sporting events, the Republican lawmaker hasn’t taken too kindly to reporting on the matter.

After Cruz announced he would be attending the Astros’ 2023 ALCS Game 7 matchup against the Texas Rangers, Rolling Stone magazine published an article about Astros fans begging the senator via social media to stay home.

Cruz blasted the article, calling Rolling Stone’s editorial staff “lying hacks.”

 The Astros would end up losing that game to the Rangers, 11-4.

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This article appears in Apr 2-15, 2025.

Michael Karlis is a multimedia journalist at the San Antonio Current, whose coverage in print and on social media focuses on local and state politics. He is a graduate of American University in Washington,...