The Texas A&M Aggies achieved a historic win on Saturday, with an impressive comeback victory against a South Carolina Gamecocks team that put them on a first-half upset alert. The Aggies went into the locker room down 30-3 at halftime, and emerged as a completely different team in the second half.
While quarterback Marcel Reed struggled in the first half, those struggles were in the rear-view mirror after halftime. The Heisman Trophy candidate focused on winning the game and led his squad on four touchdown drives to claim a 31-30 victory.
Reed shook off two interceptions and finished with an incredible 439 passing yards and three touchdown passes. Two of his receivers combined for 297 of those yards, with KC Concepcion tallying 158 yards on seven receptions and Ashton Bethel-Roman getting 139 yards on four receptions.
The defense also came through in the final few minutes of the game, preventing the Gamecocks from completing a drive that would’ve put them in field-goal range to win. Following Texas A&M’s biggest comeback win in team history, head coach Mike Elko spoke about the Aggies’ effort.
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“Wow. Don’t know where else really to start. Credit to our guys. Credit for how they stuck to it. Credit with how they rallied. Credit with how they came together. Thought they did a really good job of staying positive and fighting to the next play,” he said in an opening statement.
“For them to go out in the second half and do what they did, that’s championship-level football,” Elko said at his postgame press conference.
He indicated the team didn’t do “anything right” in the first half, but they overcame that and performed what was necessary to win the game. Elko said they had to regain their identity as a team and that the players “believed they were going to win that game in the second half.”
When asked what he told his quarterback, Marcel Reed, after his first-half struggles, Elko said he mainly told him to “just relax.” Elko indicated that the “positives and negatives” all fall on the quarterback, and the game’s “choppy” first-half rhythm affected Reed. However, he said A&M going “tempo” to start the second half helped Reed “become loose and free and playing” as he needed to.
Before Elko spoke, an off-camera individual at the press conference provided a brief statement, mentioning a “housekeeping note” that there would be no discussion of speculation about contract extensions for the A&M head coach. She asked reporters to keep their questions focused on the game.
Just as the game was getting underway, ESPN reported (via sources) that Texas A&M was finalizing a new deal worth $11 million per season that would run from 2026 through 2031. Per ESPN’s report, the deal would put Elko among the five highest-paid coaches in college football.
While that extension speculation is ongoing, a comeback win like Saturday’s certainly adds to his stature as one of the top coaches in NCAA football. With the hard-fought victory, the Aggies remain undefeated at a perfect 10-0 and are looking at an opening-round bye for the College Football Playoff bracket, barring any bizarre occurrences.
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