A&M, I fear, has a brief window of opportunity to take that next step forward and it has to be in the next year or two.

Say what you will about the Whorns ability to screw up a wet dream, but once they are in the SEC they'll start gobbling up recruits from Texas who were holding out to play in the SEC. That is going to cut into A&M's big advantage. I'm not saying it is going to turn the Aggies into UTEP over night, but it has started the clock ticking.

Alabama... well they are still pretty scary, but I don't think anyone thinks they are as dangerous as they were in previous years. No insult intended to Saban mind you. Is LSU the real deal or do they have their issues? We know Ole Miss is going to lose some games they should have won. The West is very winnable this year.

If A&M is going to make the SEC Championship game and potentially put their name in the hat for the playoffs they kind of need to do it now. Especially since I'm not sure the Petrino and Jimbo marriage of convenience is going to be a long term deal.

Unfortunately for A&M, they weren't great last year. They were pretty bad actually. Can a team go from a 5-7 year to the CFP? That is a pretty tall order.

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Posted by Windy City

Member since Jun 2019

1752 posts

Posted on 8/7/23 at 12:08 pm to Arksulli

quote:
A&M, I fear, has a brief window of opportunity to take that next step forward and it has to be in the next year or two.

Maybe but probably not. . .we seem to have an endless runway for assembling great expectations and then sh$%ting our pants.

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Posted by Windy City

Member since Jun 2019

1752 posts

Posted on 8/7/23 at 12:12 pm to Arksulli

quote:
Unfortunately for A&M, they weren't great last year. They were pretty bad actually. Can a team go from a 5-7 year to the CFP? That is a pretty tall order.

Yeah . . pretty unlikely but we all did watch that 2012 3-9 Auburn team morph into the the 2013 SEC champs that narrowly lost to FSU in the national title game.

Still amazing how that unfolded. It is not impossible (except for us I am guessing).

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Posted by Texas Gentleman

Texas

Member since Sep 2015

2646 posts

Posted on 8/7/23 at 12:16 pm to Arksulli

quote:
A&M, I fear, has a brief window of opportunity to take that next step forward and it has to be in the next year or two. Say what you will about the Whorns ability to screw up a wet dream, but once they are in the SEC they'll start gobbling up recruits from Texas who were holding out to play in the SEC. That is going to cut into A&M's big advantage.

I think people underestimate how many good recruits there are in the state, sure some years may be a bit thin at a certain positions but there’s lots of great athletes in this state, both schools will continue to get “theirs”.

Yes the sec move helped A&M, but we’ve also heavily invested in better facilities and are pouring resources/support into the program at a much greater rate than we ever did in the Big12/SWC.

Timing for A&M will be just like anybody else: putting together the right recruiting classes, having a good coaching staff on hand, catching other teams in the conference on a slight down year, and luck.

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Posted by AGGIES

Member since Jul 2021

5781 posts

Posted on 8/7/23 at 1:39 pm to Arksulli