Monster Defensive Lineman Returning to Texas A&M Football for Senior Year

Shemar Turner Expected to Return to Texas A&M Football; Aggies Will Boast One of Nation's Best DL Units in 2024

Shemar Turner, a former five-star prospect from the 2021 recruiting class, is expected to forgo the NFL draft and return to Texas A&M football for his senior year, according to Carter Karels of 247Sports. Today was the final day for underclassmen to submit their names for the draft.

Turner was one of the best linemen for the Aggies this past year, which is some high praise, given how well the unit as a whole was playing. Even for all the sacks and TFLs that the Aggies piled up in 2023, there was concern about the lack of a true edge rusher coming into the year; Turner was made to step into that role despite profiling as more of an inside-outside SDE type, but he still excelled at it.

In 12 games this past season, Turner notched 33 tackles, 10.5 TFLs, and 6 sacks. He was limited by an injury in the latter part of the year which kept him out of the bowl game, but when he was going at full speed, as he was earlier in the year, he was nigh unstoppable.

Turner's return cements the Aggie defensive front, going into 2024, as one of the nation's best. Texas A&M football can roll out a starting lineup of Nic Scourton, Shemar Turner, David Hicks, and Shemar Stewart. This is not to mention that they can mix in talents such as Cashius Howell as a pure EDGE, Gabriel Brownlow-Dindy as an explosive and destructive nose tackle, and Samu Taumanpepe as a space-eating, run-stuffing monster in the middle. For that matter, Rylan Kennedy showed a lot in his snaps at the EDGE position during the bowl, and I wouldn't be surprised to see him get considerable playing time next year.

That's a two-deep four-man group of premier talent, all the way down. For whatever the Aggies lost htis past year, they may be returning an even better line—and I, for one, can't wait to see them in action.