Aggies miss out on exciting NCAA tournament finish    

On April 7, the March Madness NCAA tournament concluded with a clash between the Houston Cougars and the Florida Gators. 

Despite ‘madness’ being in the name, the tournament was relatively tame compared to those in the past.  

Where the tournament was famous for upsets and Cinderella runs, there was a distinct lack of drama this year, with all four No. 1 seeded teams reaching the Final Four. 

This Final Four is where it gets kicked up a notch. First, there was a rematch between the Florida Gators and their SEC foe, the Auburn Tigers. 

Despite being down multiple possessions for long stretches of the game, the Gators rallied behind their star Walter Clayton Jr. to steal a win. 

A similar story happened on the other side of the bracket between Houston and Duke. The Blue Devils controlled the contest for its entire duration, but the Cougars rallied from behind, overcoming a seven-point deficit in the last 90 seconds of the game. 

The drama stretched into the championship, as Houston led for almost the entire game; the Gators, in fact, had the lead for barely a minute’s worth of time in a 40-minute contest. However, when it mattered most, Florida guarded a two-point lead for the last 20 seconds, not allowing a single shot, and secured the title for the third time in the school’s history. 

Notably missing from this end-of-tournament drama were our beloved fightin’ Texas Aggies.

Our Aggies did not live up to the hype this tourney. About 30 games into the season, they were ranked number 7 in the country, with a physical, gritty style of play that led to one of the best defenses in the nation. 

However, this hype would not last long.

Texas A&M would lose four of their last five going into the SEC tournament, but that one win would breed tremendous hype. 

They would beat number one Auburn, who had held that honor most of the season, by double digits at Reed Arena. The win led to major expectations going into the SEC tournament; their first game versus LSU was a cakewalk.

Their next game, however, was an epic letdown. 

An overtime loss to lowly Texas in their first year in the SEC, in which they ended up middle of the pack. A&M, however, lost the most. 

Their inability to shoot outside of Wade Taylor IV was extremely exposed in this game, not being able to outduel lowly Texas in a game in which they had nothing at stake, and we had everything to play for. 

This loss meant that we went from a two seed in the tournament back when Texas A&M was 7th in the country, all the way down to a four seed, a huge blow for the players’ and coach’s confidence. 

Our first-round matchup against lowly Yale had upset potential, but A&M held on to win by double digits, despite an ever-shrinking money line that was once firmly in A&M’s favor.

Texas A&M’s next game against Michigan was doomed from the start. They were a better team than us that day, and with so little momentum going into the game, A&M had little chance to be the underdog against such a solid team.

We would lose by double digits in a game that we were not really ever favored to win.

Ultimately, this season was a failure. Sky-high expectations going into the year that almost seemed realistic at one point this season, but Texas A&M fell short.

This year and tournament were a slap in the face. Buzz Williams is gone, Wade Taylor graduated, and a lot of our guys followed Buzz to Maryland.

Now, Bucky McMillan from Samford is tasked with leading our gutted program back to glory. Can he do it? I have hope.