UT played spoiler to end the Aggies undefeated season. But did the Longhorns do enough to make things weird on the College Football Playoff Committee?
AUSTIN, Texas — The time has come for the 120th Lone Star Showdown between state-rivals #3 Texas A&M and #16 Texas.
In Texas, this rivalry just means more. I mean what other schools hate on one another in each of their fight songs? Not many.
The Aggies come into this matchup seeking an undefeated season to add to their already historic 2025 campaign. While the Longhorns are looking to play spoiler and find anyway they can into the College Football Playoff.
Will Texas A&M saw ’em off to secure a spot in their first-ever SEC Championship game, or will the Longhorns make things weird for the College Football Committee in Austin?
Lets find out!
If you love defense, this first half was for you as the first several drives for both the Aggies and Longhorns resulted in punts.
But the game came to a complete halt when Heisman-candidate Marcel Reed went down after a non-contact a leg injury.
The entire city of Austin could’ve heard a pin drop as Reed remained on the ground for a good amount of time and Aggie fans began seeing flashbacks of what they call “battered Aggie syndrome.”
All of that just to be followed up by a blocked field goal by the Longhorns to keep the game knotted at 0.
A&M fans took a sigh of relief when cameras caught Reed doing cuts on the sidelines as the defense went onto the field.
Arch Manning began to lead the Longhorns down the field on the back of the RBB who killed the Aggies on the ground just a year ago, Quintrevion Wisner.
Mason Shipley hooked the first points through the uprights for the Horns in the first half. (3-0)
Reed came back onto the field and drove the offense down the field without a hitch in his step, leading to A&M’s backup kicker to redeem himself midway through the 2nd quarter. (3-3)
The Aggies’ stonewall third-down defense showed to be true as they forced UT to punt the ball back to give Reed another shot to take the lead before intermission.
And that’s exactly what he did.
On what looked like a read-option jet sweep, Reed gave it to the speedy KC Concepcion and let him dance his way into the endzone for the first touchdown of the 120th Lone Star Showdown. (10-3 | HALFTIME)
At the half, the head-to-head QB matchup looked as follows:
Arch Manning
- 8/19 completions | 38.1%
- 51 passing yards | 27 rushing yards
- 0 TDs | 0 INTs
Marcel Reed
- 10/15 completions | 66.7%
- 94 passing yards | 45 rushing yards
- 0 TDs | 0 INTS
The beginning of the second half mirrored the first as defense dominated on both side before the Longhorns were able to get a field goal after Manning was called for intentional grounding on third down in Aggie territory. (10-6)
After another A&M punt, Wisner came alive again to become the first 100-yard rusher for UT this year before Arch Manning lofted one to his favorite targets Wingo in the back of the endzone to give the Longhorns their first lead of the second half. (13-10)
UT Head Coach Steve Sarkisian pulled out his bag of tricks to get Nick Townsend his first touch of the season, which threw the Aggies off and gained him his first touchdown of the year as well. (20-10)
It took the Aggies five minutes into the 4th quarter to finally respond when EJ Smith ran it in to narrow the Longhorns’ lead. (20-17)
Manning settled in and drove down the field before using his legs to scamper all the way in for a 35-yard touchdown, extending UT’s lead back up to 10 points. (27-17)
As Reed hurried the offense into the redzone, he made his first big mistake of the night by throwing an interception inside the five yard line to give UT the ball back with three and a half minutes left to play.
After the defense bottled up the Longhorns offense, Reed came back out onto the field and threw another interception to put the nail in the coffin.
The Texas Longhorns were able to run out the rest of the clock as A&M was out of timeouts and sealed the game. (27-17 | FINAL)