That was an extremely stinging loss for Texas A&M, no two ways about it. Despite the fact that the Aggies came in as a decided underdog, the way the game against South Carolina eventually developed ended up causing a lot of heartache among the fanbase when A&M eventually dropped it at the end— the Aggies had a lot of missed opportunities that could have won them the game.
The scapegoat from a lot of fans has once again been quarterback Marcel Reed, who ended the day 25/43 for 251 yards through the air with no touchdowns or interceptions. There was a lot that went wrong in this game, but whether out of habit or an actual feeling that he was the problem, there's still been a lot of fingers pointing at Marcel.
Mike Elko, who hasn't been afraid to call a spade a spade in his pressers, was not of that opinion, however— and he said as much after the game. Fans took a lot of issue with his answer, but at the end of the day, Mike Elko is absolutely right.
Marcel Reed is not to blame for South Carolina loss, and Mike Elko knows it
Here's what he had to say about Marcel's play after the game:
Mike Elko on Marcel Reed's play: "I thought he played well... I thought that was his best game of the year, and I thought we operated, for the most part, better than we have for most of the year."
— TexAgs (@TexAgs) November 8, 2026
You can see a fuller video of his answer down below:
Mike Elko on the performance of Texas A&M QB Marcel Reed vs. No. 21 South Carolina: pic.twitter.com/AJY3auFHv4
— TexAgs (@TexAgs) November 8, 2026
It seems like most of the animus from fans is aimed at the idea that this was Marcel's best game when he didn't throw a single touchdown. As I said last night on X, though, this is a wonderful opportunity to see a wedge between process-based and results-based thinking— from the former perspective, Marcel did in fact have his best game of the year, but from the latter, he did not.
As an example, let's say Marcel had a game where he didn't throw a single incompletion, but every pass he threw was tipped— it just so happened that there always was a receiver in the area that was able to come down with the ball every time. Compare that to a hypothetical game where Marcel has no completions, but he's on target every single time— it's just that the receivers dropped every pass he threw.
Process-based thinking says that Marcel himself played better in the second game, because he was on target and on time with his passes: it's the receivers who were the issue. From this point of view, the first game was actually pretty bad: if you keep having your passes tipped, sooner or later, something bad is going to happen. Results-based thinking says the first game is better, because you only look at what happened in the end, and if you compare a game with no incompletions to a game with only incompletions, then the answer should be clear.
Most coaches are process-based thinkers— "the process" actually has become a meme from Nick Saban, who talked about it all the time. It's from this perspective that Elko is analyzing Marcel's game, and he's 100% correct: if you watched the game and were focusing in on Reed and how he played, compared to the other games this year, he did his job as a quarterback much better than he has at any other point this year.
If you're upset about failing to score a touchdown, then realize that Reed did what he needed to do for a touchdown to be scored: he had a perfectly placed fade pass to Isaiah Horton that no. 7 dropped (due in no small part to uncalled interference on the play, but that's besides the point). A penalty on the next play— and two false starts directly after— moved the Aggies way back and ended up taking away their opportunity to score.
This was the game in which Marcel looked the most like his 2025 self so far this season, outside of maybe game one against Missouri State. Elko's not performing some appeasement of the locker room by observing that; he's accurately describing what happened in the game.
There's been an outcry for weeks for Marcel to be benched and Brady Hart to start. It's hard to switch back up for fans, but Marcel answered the call both against Alabama and South Carolina and started playing better than he has all season. There are plenty of problems with this team, but we have to have the ability to understand what's broken and what's not— if you burn it all down instead of keeping what's good, then you'll be unnecessarily starting from square one.
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