The Texas A&M football team will get somewhat of a break from the SEC gauntlet in a game against Mississippi State on Saturday. Still, this game has quickly turned into the most important contest of the season for the Aggies, with a lot to prove at home.
Since A&M joined the SEC in 2012, the battles between these two teams have gone both ways. The Aggies currently hold the edge in the win department in that time frame with five wins to the Bulldogs’ four.
Strangely, almost every game in this series since 2012 has finished in blowout fashion. Eight of nine have finished with the victor winning by at least two scores. This one could go either way, so what do the Aggies have to watch for in this contest?
Here are the three biggest factors in Texas A&M’s series against Mississippi State.
Factor No. 1: The Texas A&M football team’s offense
I’d like to give credit to Colorado and Arkansas, both of whom held the Aggies to ten points or less. That said, I’d be lying to everybody.
Neither of those games told the tale of a particularly strong defensive unit. Instead, we saw just how bad this Texas A&M offense is when its primary players are out of the game. I don’t have many worries about the Aggies stopping Mike Leach’s air raid offense, but I do worry that Texas A&M’s offense won’t be able to keep up.
The Aggies haven’t scored more than ten points against a Power Five opponent yet this season. That will have to turn around on Saturday if Jimbo Fisher wants a win.
Factor No. 2: Who will win the battle between MSU’s pass offense and TAMU’s pass defense?
This, without a doubt, is the biggest in-game storyline to keep an eye on in Texas A&M’s battle against Mississippi State. Sure, Mike Leach’s air raid offense hasn’t reached the same level that it was at Washington State, but the Bulldogs have a lethal passing game this year.
Mississippi State currently ranks sixth in passing yards per contest, though the statistics make it sound better than it is. The Bulldogs, while they have accumulated a lot of yardage, have done it through sheer volume of passes. In terms of yards per attempt, Leach’s team is not particularly strong.
They average just 6.46 yards per attempt through the air. To put that into perspective, the dead Texas A&M offense averages 6.38 yards per attempt.
This may be a battle that heavily favors an Aggie secondary, which has proven to be one of the best in the entire country. The real test here is whether A&M’s offense can keep its defense off of the field long enough to stay rested.
We did see A&M’s pass defense exposed a little bit against Arkansas in the first half, but they clamped up in the final 30 minutes, allowing just three points. A&M currently holds the third-best passing defense by yardage, allowing just 119.5 yards per game.
Factor No. 3: Can the Texas A&M football team limit their mistakes and play timely football?
So far this season, nobody has been calling home and telling their parents about this Texas A&M football team. It’s been a forgettable year. That said, to call this team bad would be a huge exaggeration — A&M still has an elite defense, things just haven’t worked out quite yet. Why is this?
For starters, the Aggies have been shooting themselves in the foot, to an extent. Jimbo Fisher noted this in his weekly press conference, mentioning how his team couldn’t get the run game going late against Arkansas after a penalty sent them toward first-and-20 on the second to last drive of the game.
On the season, A&M is averaging 61.2 penalty yards per game, which is 82nd in the country. That’s not good.
Granted, the Aggies have been playing more than a handful of backups and young players, but this still has to stop. A&M fans have watched too many drives come to an end before they begin.
WIth one of the worst Power Five offenses in football, Texas A&M can’t be setting themselves back at all. If they’re able to play mistake-free football, they could finally see some positive offensive production on Saturday.