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From Chris Fowler, the highly-respected host of ESPN’s College Gameday, to obscure reporters on college football websites, the Texas Longhorns have been tabbed as automatic shoo-ins for the Big 12 title game should the Oklahoma Sooners finish with two losses in the conference race. At the very least, the experts have already penciled in a 10-1 Longhorn team in a BCS bowl as an at-large entry. Apparently, Mack’s media machine has churned out the memo, and everyone except the Aggies have received it. Said Bob Harig of ESPN.com: "The Longhorns (8-1) were discarded after their early-October loss to Oklahoma, but all they’ve done is win every game since, and have done so impressively. Quarterback Chris Simms has put up good numbers, and Texas has put itself in position – if the Sooners stumble again. Texas’ strength of schedule is only 40, and the only way the Longhorns can move up into Rose Bowl territory is to get to the Big 12 championship game. And the only way that can happen is if Oklahoma loses. Then, Texas would have to defeat Nebraska to get to Pasadena." Perhaps the game really is in Austin this year because the Horns couldn’t find any rooms or breakfast buffets in College Station. But the schedule in front of me says UT must play at Kyle Field the day after Thanksgiving. The Longhorns carry clout with the Big 12 higher-ups, but a home-and-another-home series with the Aggies hardly seems possible. No, the Longhorns begrudgingly have to bus their way into the country to the hamlet of College Station to play some football. They have to go where they hate going: Into their Aggieland abyss.
Texas has beaten A&M only twice in 18 years in Kyle Field, with the latest win coming in 1995 when the Aggies suffered six turnovers. In the nine games during that span at Kyle Field, Texas is 2-7 and has been outscored in the seven losses by a combined score of 179-88. Since 1985 at Kyle Field, the Horns have not scored more than 16 points in victory or defeat. Since 1984, the Aggies are 13-4 against Texas at home or away, and the two teams have won their respective home games against their rival since the Big 12 began in 1996. So why all the national optimism that A&M will be part of UT’s 10-1 parade, even though the game is at Kyle Field? It’s strictly a numbers game: The Horns have top-five recruiting classes piled up like Dixie Chicken dominoes. And they have some incredible talents who actually have lived up to their Signing Day hype. Players like receivers Roy Williams and B.J. Johnson, cornerback Quentin Jammer, and freshman sensations Cedric Benson at running back and Derrick Johnson at linebacker pose tremendous problems for opposing teams, and the Aggies will be hard-pressed to contain these weapons. And for once, the Horns are beating people – and beating them badly – like they should. No North Carolina States or Stanfords have risen up and bitten the burnt orange. Only Oklahoma has mastered the well-balanced Longhorns. But for all of the glitz and glamour coming out of Austin, and no matter how banged up the Aggies are, this game at Kyle Field is shaping up to be another memorable one. Not since 1983 – when the Aggies bolted to a 13-0 lead before falling 45-13 – has a Texas team come to Kyle with such a lofty ranking and national stakes on the line.
And for Texas, that spells trouble. For no team in the country has to endure such an ear-splitting, miserable three hours than a Texas team that has to play in College Station. Of all the combatants in rivalry games, perhaps only Florida State when it plays at Florida and Alabama when it plays at Auburn have to put up with as much adversity as Texas playing at A&M. And Kyle Field is even becoming a harder place for the Horns to conquer. In 1999, Texas had to overcome a team and a school that just wasn’t going to lose because of the emotions surrounding the Bonfire tragedy. This year, just as Oklahoma faced last fall, Kyle Field will transform itself into the state’s largest bastion of bedlam. It will be 12th Man Towel Day, resurrecting a scene that will rival the 1985 goose-bump game that turned Kyle Field into the largest terry cloth display since a 1980 J.C. Penny sale. And a crowd of close to 88,000 is expected, frothing from the get-go as opposed to the surreal and tranquil opening scenes two years ago. There even will be 3,000 less Longhorns in the stands, as UT’s ticket allotment has shrunk to 7,000 this year and will drop even further to 4,000 in 2003. At this point, the Longhorns have played much more consistently than the Aggies, and the Longhorns pasted Texas Tech and Colorado, two teams that handed the Aggies losses. The Horns have scored over 40 points in seven games heading into last week’s Kansas game. Meanwhile, through nine games, the Aggies had scored over 30 points just twice, in victories over McNeese State and Kansas State. Quarterback Chris Simms appears as confident in the pocket as he’s ever been, and overall, the Longhorns are playing their best ball since Mack Brown took over the coaching reins in 1998. It doesn’t matter. The Longhorns might beat the Aggies, but it’s going to be another close game, like so many of the games A&M has played this year. Simms is going to have major problems checking off at the line, and the inevitable momentum switches to the maroon side will be jolting for UT. A&M has stayed close in games and qualified for a bowl game because of a sound defense that has played extremely well since the second game of the season. If the Aggies can generate any offense against the Horns, the Big 12’s best defense statistically, this game will be another classic at Kyle Field. Sure, the Longhorns look the favorite in this game if you’re analyzing stats and recalling last year’s 43-17 victory in Austin. But the peripheral stuff the Horns must face playing at Kyle Field can only be measured if you’re there in person… if you’re hearing the noise and feeling the desire Aggie fans and players have for beating Texas. Carl Reese, the Horns’ defensive coordinator, recently told Austin American-Statesman columnist Kirk Bohls that the UT coaching staff had been working on schemes for the Oklahoma, Colorado and A&M games for a year now. And he said the A&M staff has done the same. Indeed, the Texas coaches and players know the battle they’re in for on Nov. 23. Maybe they should get the memo out to their fans and the national media in a hurry.
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