College Football Countdown: 90 Days
By Matt Green
With 90 days remaining until the start of the college football season, today’s College Football Countdown focuses on one of the most crucial stats when it comes to determining a successful football team.
As the saying goes, offense wins games, but defense wins championships. And total defense is a good barometer for determining how good a team can be in the SEC.
And that leads us to no. 90 on the College Football Countdown.
90
Texas A&M ranked 90th in the NCAA in total defense in 2016.
Texas A&M allowed 441.8 yards per game last season, which was good for 90th in college football and 10th in the SEC.
It was a tale of two seasons for the Aggies in 2016. They started 6-0 and had wins over no. 16 UCLA, no. 17 Arkansas, and no. 9 Tennessee. They were ranked as high as no. 6 in the AP poll, and were even in the top four of the first College Football Playoff rankings.
But the final seven games were a different story. The Aggies went 2-5 to finish the season, with the only wins coming against New Mexico State and Texas-San Antonio.
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The turning point seemed to be the Tennessee game, one of the most thrilling contests of the season. Texas A&M held a 28-7 lead early in the second quarter before Tennessee came battling back.
Trevor Knight rushed for a 62-yard touchdown to put the Aggies up 35-21 with 3:22 remaining in the game, but the Volunteers scored two touchdowns in the final minutes to force overtime. But the Aggies prevailed with a 45-38 win in double overtime.
Prior to that game, Texas A&M was allowing 388.8 yards and 15.4 points per game. But in the final eight games the Aggies allowed 475.3 yards and 30.3 points per game.
In his five seasons at Texas A&M, Kevin Sumlin has proven he knows how to coach offense. And while it might not help that they lost guys like Myles Garrett and Justin Evans to the NFL Draft, if the Aggies are going to take a step forward in 2017, the defense will have to improve. Or 2017 could be the last for Sumlin in College Station.