DALLAS — Texas A&M offensive tackle Trey Zuhn III doesn’t remember watching the Aggies play Texas as a kid, but growing up in an A&M family, he knows how he’s supposed to feel about it.
His parents were Aggies. So was his grandmother. His grandfather was a professor at the school. “They live and breathe A&M,” he said.
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Over the years, when he went shopping with family members and came across Longhorns gear, “we’d turn it upside down.” To commemorate the return of rivalry game with Texas this year, Zuhn said he purchased a small picture of a Longhorn and hung it on his wall, near his bed, upside down.
“Don’t let a referee in there,” Zuhn joked.
On Nov. 30, after a 13-year hiatus, Texas and Texas A&M will meet on the football field again. The rivalry’s long-overdue renewal will be one of the most anticipated games of the season.
Fans and alumni on both sides, especially those who remember their last meeting in 2011 when Texas kicker Justin Tucker silenced Kyle Field with a 40-yard field goal that gave the Longhorns a 27-25 win, are well aware of the magnitude and intensity of the rivalry. But what about the players?
GO DEEPERQuinn Ewers is comfortable being Texas' headliner. Can he take the next step?Many of the Longhorns and Aggies who will take the field on Thanksgiving weekend were younger than 10 when the teams last played. Players on each team who attended SEC media days last week offered a range of perspectives on what the game means to them.
Texas left tackle Kelvin Banks, who is from the Houston area, said he grew up a Longhorns fan but was too young to have consumed the rivalry game properly.
“I only remember the game when Justin Tucker kicked the field goal,” Banks said. “I’ve just seen (highlight) clips.”
Texas quarterback Quinn Ewers was 8 when the teams last played. But he said his father told him stories.
“My dad actually said he believed growing up that the Texas A&M game was bigger than the Red (River) Rivalry game,” said Ewers, who grew up in Southlake, Texas. “I’m excited to have that game back and it’s going to be cool, especially going to Kyle Field Thanksgiving weekend. That place is going to be rockin’. We’re all fired up for it.”
Asked if he sensed the game mattered to his players considering they hadn’t played in it, Texas coach Steve Sarkisian chuckled and answered with a resounding “Yes.”
“There’s so many connections even in our locker room,” Sarkisian said. “There’s so many guys (at A&M) that players on our team played with, played against, youth football, high school football, went through the recruiting process with. And they both took visits to Texas and A&M, and one went to A&M and one came to Texas.
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“I don’t think you have to be a big rah-rah speech in the locker room that day.”
Texas A&M coach Mike Elko, who spent four seasons in College Station under Jimbo Fisher as defensive coordinator from 2018 to 2021, understands the importance of the rivalry despite having never participated in it.
“Even though we never played and we weren’t in the same conference, it still was the single most important thing, sometimes it felt like, to Texas A&M,” Elko said. “Obviously, that’s something we take very seriously.”
A&M defensive lineman Shemar Turner, a product of DeSoto, Texas, near Dallas, said he didn’t pay much attention to the rivalry when he was younger and was largely unaware of it until the Aggies began recruiting him.
With the game more than four months away, Turner said it’s not a concern right now: “We’re gonna take it a day at a time, we’re putting our head down and we’re working, trying to get better.”
Texas A&M sophom*ore linebacker Taurean York is from Temple, Texas, which is a little more than an hour away from both College Station and Austin. He said doesn’t remember too much of the rivalry game because he was too young. But he does have feelings about it now.
“Texas didn’t recruit me, so it’s personal,” York said.
That’s part of the charm of the game: There are plenty of recruiting tales on each side. As former Texas coach Mack Brown told The Athletic in 2021, “It was a game that showcased Texas high school football across the nation.”
The proximity and relationships that extend across locker rooms breed a familiarity that, in all likelihood, will raise the temperature on the game as it draws closer. If the teams are playing for major stakes, like a spot in the College Football Playoff, that will make it even more substantial.
“It’s great for the state, it’s great for college football that the rivalry is coming back,” Elko said. “When you have two brands that are that close to each other, they should play. They should play meaningful games … and with our tradition, they should play on Thanksgiving weekend.”
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“It’s a great game,” Sarkisian said. “Our players are probably way more excited for this game than most fans would probably think.”
Zuhn is working to ensure his teammates know how important it is, too.
“A lot of players in the locker room didn’t know the full extent (of the rivalry),” he said. “But myself and the fans have kind of been getting everyone on the same page that ‘Hey, this is a big deal. We’re bringing this back.’”
(Photo: Ronald Martinez / Getty Images)
Sam Khan Jr. is a senior writer for The Athletic covering college football and recruiting primarily in Texas. Previously, he spent eight years covering college sports at ESPN.com and seven years as a sports reporter at the Houston Chronicle. A native Houstonian, Sam graduated from the University of Houston. Follow Sam on Twitter @skhanjr
