The SEC Forum at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

Yup.  A 9-4 SEC champ would very often not be a top four conference champ.  

The truth is that A&M is just not a good football team this year, and that’s ok. We’re in year 1 with a new coach, coming off a 7-5 or whatever last season was. We lucked out with a weak schedule, and also we had a very capable running game with Moss. 

Our defense is Swiss cheese, and we can’t tackle. Our DB’s only way to defend is to hold the receiver.  We just lost to a very bad Auburn team, and a very average USC before that. 

I won’t entertain any thoughts of winning the game, nor proceeding to the SECCCG. Not impossible, but unlikely. 

I think it will overall be s good game, and Reed will put up respectable numbers. But Ewers is a next level QB, with next level receivers. I think Texas will score between 38-41, and we’ll score between 27-35. So my best guess is A&M 31, Texas 38.  

Tacking on to the discussion about the running game, from the other thread-- it was great to see Texas really pounding the ball to close out the 4th quarter against Kentucky.  I suspect we'd have seen the same thing against Michigan, but that game was basically over at halftime so Sark was just scrimmaging during the second half.

The key similarity being, Texas knew it was up against very strong d-lines, and so during the opening stanzas of the game, Sark used a lot of horizontal passing and horizontal running, to force the front 7 into a lot of side-to-side movement.  It worked well to tire them out, and then when they started subbing in their less experienced and less talented guys, he'd go right at them.  In the Michigan game it started working immediately in the first quarter, for Kentucky it took longer but by the end of the 3rd quarter, their defense was gassed, and the Texas running game was open to do just about whatever it wanted.

Given the talent and experience of the A&M d-line, I expect a similar strategy from Sark in this one.  I think we'll see a lot of sideways stuff early in an effort to wear out that tough d-line, plus the fact that A&M has showed some vulnerability on the outside.  But later in the game I think Sark will move the game more inside, and also start running more.  But that's only if he's got a lead or the game is close.  If Texas is trailing early, or trailing big, then he'll clearly have to open things up more.

I'd like to think he's going to take more deep shots because that's another area of vulnerability for an A&M secondary that honestly just looks completely lost quite a bit of the time, but going deep hasn't been much of a signature move for the Sark/Ewers offense, even when Ewers has been healthy.  So I'm not sure it's reasonable to expect to see it this game, either.

It's not elite, but lots of teams' deep ball isn't elite.  It's still part of the arsenal that needs to be used, and helps the entire offense, the more it needs to be treated as a threat.

When Ewers is healthy it's good enough. And I'd love to see it featured this Saturday.

OK so we were pretty much set on going, had (relatively) cheap tickets hooked up from friends, and then my i s c & a aggie told me, "You know, I really just don't want to attend in person.  It's going to be a crowded, crazy madhouse, and I don't want to bother with it."

So now we're trying to figure out how we want to watch the game.  She wants to have friends over, mixed groups of Ags and Horns.  I just don't think that's a great idea, for this first one back.  Emotions are going to be running high even amongst our most rational friends.

be sure to pass my vote onto the wife: invite them over, get everyone drunk, & then let the royal rumble ensue.

I was thinking about this today.  If you could trade one rivalry game for another ( talking W’s vs Losses), which one would it be? 

I’d trade 1998’s loss when Ricky broke the record. That was a heartbreaker. In exchange I’d give the 2007 game up.  Frans last game.

Hmmm.  I really don't know.  I hated losing that 2006 game, but it was mostly because there were 2 really obnoxious aggie fans right behind me, giving me shit toward the end of the game.  My i s c & a aggie wife was so embarrassed about their behavior, she asked them to please stop and they called her a 2%er.  Not sure what win I'd give up though.