Maroon Weekly

Performance on TV turned heads to Aggie talent

By Turner Dawson

The Texas A&M football team put up quite a fight in the Lone Star Showdown at Kyle Field, but came up just short of ruining the Texas Longhorns National Title hopes. It was a game full of big plays and missed opportunities for the Aggies but I find it hard to be too upset when I expected this one to not even be close.

Aggie QB Jerrod Johnson finally had his coming out party on national television as he completed 26 of 33 passes for 342 yards and four touchdowns with another 97 yards on the ground.

He was absolutely sensational and made some huge plays in crucial situations. Johnson has been great in the games not on television this season, but has struggled once the cameras showed up. But he saved his best game of the season for the biggest stage of the season.

Johnson was certainly helped by the superb performance by wide receiver Jeff Fuller who made some incredible catches. I would love to see the kind of numbers Jeff Fuller would put up if he could have been healthy the entire season. The fact that he is doing the things that he is doing after breaking his leg earlier in the season just makes it more impressive. Fuller finished the night with 6 catches for 132 yards and three big touchdowns.

Christine Michael also had a very nice performance as the freshman phenom ran for 83 yards on 19 carries for a steady 4.4 yard per carry average and one touchdown against one of the top run defenses in the entire country.

I for one was stunned that the Aggies managed 190 yards on the ground in this game. Texas’ front seven is about as good as they come, but give a lot of credit to the A&M offensive line for getting some push and creating some running lanes. That group has really come together and done a solid job the second half of the season.

The story of this night was the lack of anything resembling a defense on the part of the Aggies. The Texas Longhorns were three yards away from gaining 600 yards. That is simply inexcusable. It’s incredibly discouraging when players are put in positions to succeed, the coaches do their job, but the players are unable to make the play.

In the secondary, the Aggies only really have one cornerback. Terrance Frederick is a very good corner and we are fortunate to have him. Justin McQueen is a hard working guy and he gave it his all in this game but the Longhorns offense targeted him in this game. Almost every big passing play involved McQueen getting beat.

Kyle Mangan is a young player that has the potential to be a good player; He’s a great kid and works his tail off and hopefully another season in the strength and conditioning program pays off but his performance the last couple of weeks has left something to be desired.

Ultimately, it is the coaches’ job to put the players in a position to succeed and make plays. That’s what Joe Kines did and the players didn’t make the plays. At a certain point, it’s no longer about X’s and O’s, it all comes down to the Jimmy’s and Joe’s. Aggie defenders have to start making some plays.  This Aggie defense only has about 4 or 5 players that would start for other teams in the Big 12 and only one, Von Miller, that would start for a team like Texas.

Texas did everything they could to give A&M this game and the Aggies did everything they could to give it right back.

Matt Moss had a pass almost hit him in the face, he dropped it. Von Miller had a ball that hit him in the hands, he dropped it. The Aggies were inside the five and Jerrod throws an interception in the end zone. Christine Michael fumbles the ball at a crucial point in the game. And on special teams, Randy Bullock misses a chip shot to seal the win for Texas.

It was a bunch of mistakes piled on top of another that ultimately cost the Aggies. It has been the same story all season. The Aggies are so close to turning the corner but mistakes cost them. A lot of that can be attributed to the youth of this team so I will choose to look at this positively and see the signs of progress this season and hope that with experience, some of these mistakes will cease.

The good news is that the Aggies are 6-6, just like I predicted, and are bowl eligible. At the time this article is being written, it is unknown which bowl game they will be playing in but my money is on the Texas Bowl against Navy.

If the Aggies can win their bowl game and get to 7-6 on the season, I would absolutely consider this season a success and would be a believer that this program is headed in the right direction. Mike Sherman currently has a national top ten recruiting class coming off of a 4-8 season. If Sherman can hold that together and build off of this season, the Aggies should be on their way to winning these types of games.