Three Takeaways from Texas A&M Football Vaporizing MSU

Texas A&M Football Torpedoes the Bulldogs; Gets Bowl Eligible

That was one of the more unexpected results for a Texas A&M football game that I can remember—of course, now overshadowed by recent news. This was just an absolute annihilation completely out of nowhere. The offense was clicking a little bit better at the end of the Ole Miss game for the Aggies, but the defense had somewhat lost its luster by that point; especially with the news that it would be Jaylen Henderson at the controls for the Aggies in this game, I in no way thought that the Ags would put up an even more impressive offensive performance in this game than the last one.

I’ll say this: this game was a strange inversion, of sorts, of the normal pattern for Texas A&M football games under Jimbo. What I mean by that is this: normally, big wins under Jimbo have followed a pattern of playing a team extremely well statistically—i.e., soundly defeating them in terms of yards per play, yards per attempt, yards per carry, success rate, PPA/play, or whatever else—but the final score looks way closer than the actual game was. Two prime examples from this season are the Auburn and Arkansas games: in both of these, the Aggies absolutely decimated their opponent with regard to the stat sheet, but they only won those games by margins of 17 and 12 points respectively when all was said and done.

This game was different. If you look at the difference in yards per play, it’s not that far off (4.15 for State vs an even 6 for the Aggies). Time of possession was about even. This wasn’t some offensive explosion or complete defensive stonewalling by the Aggies like we have seen in the past. And yet what it did end up being was a game where Texas A&M football created and capitalized on opportunities, showcased a masterclass in efficiency, and dominated an inferior opponent.

Let’s talk about takeaways.