By ROBERT CESSNAThe Texas A&M football team continues to move forward, but it's hard to get excited over baby steps when the rest of Big 12 South teams are dominating national headlines.
A&M has back-to-back victories for the first time since early last season, but that pales in comparison to what its rivals are doing.
* Texas Tech is 9-0 and got there by beating a top-ranked team for the first time in school history.
* Texas came within seconds in that epic loss to Tech of remaining unbeaten, almost completing a magical four-week run that earned the Longhorns plenty of attention with victories over Oklahoma, Missouri and Oklahoma State.
* Oklahoma and Oklahoma State are each 8-1 and in the mix for the Big 12 championship and a possible national championship.
Even Baylor continues to surprise with first-year head coach Art Briles and freshman quarterback Robert Griffin. North Division favorite Missouri needed a late interception Saturday to hold off the feisty Bears, 31-28.
Thus, A&M's come-from-behind 24-17 victory over Colorado was barely a footnote in college football's best division, yet it was vital to the team's progress toward closing the gap with the league's elite.
A&M has been playing better since taking a 23-20 halftime lead against Tech three weeks ago. You can see gradual improvement in all phases, but the biggest change has been players buying into what first-year head coach Mike Sherman is doing.
Everyone is on the same page, which was evident Saturday. The Aggies won despite the offense having only one good quarter. It was the kind of game a team with dissenters finds a way to lose.
This has been a smooth transition despite losing the opener to Arkansas State and having unproven sophomore quarterback Jerrod Johnson replace injured senior Stephen McGee. It would have been easy for the Aggies to go 2-10.
This team is far ahead of Dennis Franchione's initial team. The 2003 squad never led in its last three games, being outscored 168-37 and finishing 4-8. That won't happen again. Oklahoma, a 25-point favorite for Saturday's game at Kyle Field, might score 60, but it won't be 77-0.
Now, A&M might lose its last three games. Realistically, the best the Aggies can do is win at Baylor. Yet, if the Aggies can stay within a touchdown of Oklahoma or Texas heading into the fourth quarter, it could be bigger than even beating Baylor.
A&M needed the victories over Iowa State and Colorado to reinforce what Sherman is implementing. Winning in the last three regular season games remains the focus, but the program could move forward in a loss, which was the case when Tech rallied for a 43-25 victory.
It's hard to accept moral victories, because that's exactly where this program was five years ago.
While A&M floundered, Texas Tech's Mike Leach built a program to rival Texas and Oklahoma, and now Oklahoma State's Mike Gundy is challenging to do the same thing.
Sherman understands what's expected. He's put all his energy into winning the next game, making sure the upperclassmen are productive leaders, yet managing to build for the future by relying heavily on freshmen.
Aggies are hopeful these baby steps will turn into national headlines in the very near future.
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Saturday's no-shows for a game that wasn't televised and played in near-perfect weather had to be disturbing to die-hard Aggies. The announced crowd -- which includes sold tickets -- was 78,121.
The crowd looked considerably smaller than the announced crowd of 78,669 for Kansas State. The Manhattan (Kan.) Mercury reported for that game that 10,000 fans must have showed up as empty seats. If that's the case, Saturday's crowd for Colorado was in the low 60,000s -- which was still more than Texas Tech's record-setting crowd of 56,333 on Saturday against Texas.
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A&M's victory over Colorado gives the Aggies a 7-20 record in November this decade. A&M hasn't had a winning record in November since 1999. ... A&M averages 110.7 yards rushing per game, which ranks 102nd in the country.
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ABC will televise Saturday's A&M-Oklahoma game at 2:30 p.m. The league's other TV games will be Baylor at Texas, 11 a.m. (FSN), Iowa State at Colorado, 12:30 p.m. (Versus), Kansas State at Missouri, 6 p.m. (FSN) and Oklahoma State at Texas Tech, 7 p.m. (ABC).
Robert Cessna's e-mail address is robert.cessna@theeagle.com.
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Posted by: drlgsideways On: 11/7/2008
Comment Title: OU Looking Past A&M
From the midst of the sooner nation. Absolutely no talk about the A&M game from the fans and the media. They are talking about the BCS scenarios ad nauseum. They give A&M NO chance and are predicting a romp. Hopefully that is true with their players also. Also an OU alumnus that has very good connections to their coaches told me Fran was notorious for hammering the scouting services to raise the star ratings for his recruits. For what it is worth. The guy just offered it up while we were discussing the upcoming game and the amount of freshman players seeing action for A&M.
Posted by: JimBob78 On: 11/5/2008
Comment Title: I'll Play Along
Miller, How is Bryne responsible for "allowing negative recruiting to fester"? How do you know how many offers Sherman sends out? What are your sources?
Posted by: miller58 On: 11/5/2008
Comment Title: NegNag!
?
Posted by: shiner On: 11/4/2008
Comment Title: Quitter58
You must be a totally reasonable, yet clairvoyant, person. Please blame Sherman for whoever gets elected President as well. Come back in 2013 and tell me you told me so. I promise this will be my last response to your rants.
Posted by: spud87 On: 11/4/2008
Comment Title: re: miller58
does it really matter how many 4 & 5 star players fran was bringing in? because if i recall his 1st class was 8th in the nation, along with several other good/great classes-but what did he do with any of them???? nothing, that's why he got fired! so drop the subject.
Posted by: miller58 On: 11/4/2008
Comment Title: Re: austinagg23
My personal opinions: austinagg23, A&M committed 14 four and five star players for the Feb 08 class. A&M was in the final cut for 2 more five stars and 4 more four stars, with a couple more backups. A&M was bringing a total of 20 difference makers! The loss of these players, I lay completely at the feet of Bill Byrne's incompetant actions that allowed negative recruiting to fester to decommits! I did not realize also at the time how incompetant a job Byrne did in hiring a head coach who is a complete dud at recruiting and coaching. It's like Sherman is in a daze? Sherman ended up with signing only 7 of the difference makers in Feb 08, and I can think of at least a dozen head coaches that would have re-recruited some of the decommits as well. I hold Sherman completely responsible for the Feb 09 class which he will sign a year and 3 months after he began collecting his $5000 a day pay 24/7/365/7, and there is no other word to describe it except crappy. A&M under RC and Fran have aneraged signing 6 four and five star recruits every year this decade; Under Sherman this year we offered over 40 difference makers, lost every head to head and absolutely suck with only 3 difference makers, maybe four if Stewart doesn't decommit as expected. Historically, almost every good head coach recruits well his first year from Bear, to Jackie, to Weis, to Saban, etc and Sherman ain't. Any coach can lose games his first year, but if he can't recruit that first year lights out, he's gone! A&M is looking to finish ranked as bad as 30+ to 40+? Sherman is punishing ticket holders by not playing starters full minutes, punishing them as well, in lew of fish. Byrne is responsible for this incompetant hire, Sherman is responsible for the incompetant hire of 9 assistants with almost no difference maker recruiting experience; and both should be replaced today! Sherman,s stupid move to fill up this summer with lower level 2 and 3 stars, compounded with Byrne's last year screw ups, leaves each and every Big 12 team in position to pass us in recruiting for this year, because they still have 1/3 to 1/2 of their commits free to add difference makers, and A&M has no room! This in addition to nebraska and osu as discussed! In addition A&M sent out offers for 2010 2 months ago, has committed none, but jumping ahead of us, tech and tulsa have already picked off three from A&M's recruiing list. This Byrne/Sherman mess has us at the very bottom through 2013, maybe beyond? miller58.
Posted by: austinagg23 On: 11/3/2008
Comment Title: miller
Miller, you claim that Nebraska has out-recruited us for 5 years and OSU has out-recruited us for 3 years. My question to you is how can that possibly be Mike Sherman's fault?
Posted by: miller58 On: 11/3/2008
Comment Title: Re; shiner
My personal opinions: shiner, I know I was shocked also to see how bad A&M is recruiting in comparison to the rest of the Big 12; Here are the actual numbers of teams passing up A&M recruiting four and five stars; Nebraska for five years, Feb 04-Feb08 signed a total of 34 four and five star players, and caught up and passed A&M who signed only 33; okie state for Feb 06-07-08 and committed this year has a total of 20 four and five star players and caught up and passed A&M who has only 19 players for this same four year period, already. The kicker is A&M is full with 25 commits already this year, but Okie state has roon to still commit 18 more players this year, and with almost half of the four and five star difference makers still uncommitted, osu can be expected to widen this advantage by Feb 09. tu and ou average 14 each year for this decade, and tech kills us by out coaching us each year. Colorado also out recruited us last year with 8. Its likely at this point because they all have lots of room and lots of difference makers are still out there, that several more big 12 teams will out recruit us as well by Feb 09. Right now looking at the recruiting rankings, and still so many difference makers out there, A&M could end up as low as 40+ and no higher than 30+. A sure way for us to stay at the bottom of the Big 12 for the next five years. Also A&M sent out offers for 2010 2 months ago, but has signed zero of them, but tech has already signed 2 off our recruiting list, and tulsa 1. Not unusual though, with this crappy recruiting head coach, because we lost an OL head to head with tulsa in the current class. There is hope though, Fulmer at Tennessee was fired yesterday, joining two other first year coaches and 2 others already fired. miller58.
Posted by: Shiner On: 11/3/2008
Comment Title: Quitter58
Talk about a spin machine!! What exactly is a "lower 2 and 3 star" player? Nebraska has not beat us the last five years for 4 and 5 stars and Okie state sure has not . We out-recruited OSU and Nebraska last year and much of the difference was because of Sherman's late add-ons. So far, neither team is anywhere close to us for 2009. I understand they don't have many commits at this point but, as you say, Feb. is only a few months away. So how these two teams are currently out-recruiting Sherman is a mystery to me. There are alot of players on our recruiting list that committed to other schools. The commits we have were on other schools' lists too! Interesting conclusions you draw from that little scenario. Again, 2009 is Sherman's first full recruiting class and it is currently a top 25 class. Maybe it will stay there, maybe it will slip outside the top 25. Either way, saying we should fire him at this point is just plain ridiculous. I will admit that there are some coaches we could have hired that might have made a bigger splash (he was not my first choice) and perhaps bring in a slightly better FIRST class, but now that he is here, he has to get a chance.
Posted by: miller58 On: 11/3/2008
Comment Title: A&M is worse in 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, and 2013!
My personal opinions; A&M won 7 and 9 regular season games the last two years, and A&M committed 14 four and five difference makers last year! The math I learned at A&M, says to improve, we have to first win 10 regular season games, and commit 15 four and five star difference makers to just barely improve over the level of the last two years? Is the Aggie Spin Machine just trying to bs us, again???? Get serious;D1 coaches say they win 90% of their games at the time they sign high school seniors. With us mostly signing only the lower level 2 and 3 star players last year and this year, we filled a huge 2 year gap with players that are a couple of steps slower, a couple of inches smaller, and a couple of levels less athletic tham teams signing four and five star difference makers that are ranked at that level because they are a couple of steps faster, a couple of inches bigger, and a couple of levels higher in athleticism. Besides tech, tu, and ou that beat us almost every year, now osu is out recruiting us the last four years for four and five star players, as well as Nebraska for 5 years, and even colorado last year. When A&M signs lower level players like this, it means we are deluting the whole squad worse every year until they are red shirt seniors in 2013. So far Tech has already committed 2 players and tulsa 1 player off A&M's recruiting list. A&M Sent out 2010 offers two momths ago, and still has committed zero! A third class signed by Sherman as bad as the first two just means continued disaster in 2014! Tennessee fired their head coach yesterday, added to the irings already at Clemson, los Angeles, Auburn, etc. A&M should act today to stop this continuing disaster that is A&M's recruiting! miller58.
