Under first-year head coach Bucky McMillan, Texas A&M men’s basketball has exceeded expectations with a clear path to the NCAA Tournament. Written off at the beginning of the season, the Aggies defied the odds, starting Southeastern Conference play with a dominant 7-1 record. Alone atop the SEC, reality crept in for the Maroon and White, as they went on to lose 4 of their next 5 games in a midseason gauntlet.
With postseason aspirations on the line, the battered and bruised Aggies regrouped to steal a pair of must-win games against the Ole Miss Rebels and Oklahoma Sooners. Now sitting at fifth in the SEC with a record of 9-5 in conference play, A&M aims for a dominant finish to the regular season.
“I want to finish this thing off right,” McMillan said. “I got a number in mind that I want to get to, that’s 13. I think that you have to keep grinding. We don’t have any bad losses. We’ve shown that we are a great team, at home and on the road, particularly. If you think about our road games, in the toughest league in the country, and the SEC has the toughest places to play in the country, we’ve gone to Alabama, and we lost by three, we won at Auburn, won at Texas, won at Georgia, won at Oklahoma and double-overtime at Tennessee.”
According to ESPN’s Joe Lunardi, A&M currently sits as a 9-seed, with Delphi Bracketology in agreement. Nevertheless, the Maroon and White have been sure not to get ahead of themselves, maintaining focus on the games to come in their schedule.
“Focus on playing good basketball, everything else should take care of itself,” McMillan said. “Everybody knows each other by now. We know what the other players can do; they know what our players can do. They’re going to know what defenses we run, and we’re going to know what they run. You don’t see too many ‘I gotcha’ plays out there at this time of year.”
A&M will play rival Texas on Saturday, Feb. 28, at Reed Arena, with tipoff set for 3 p.m. The Aggies look to face a similar Longhorn team they saw in their 74-70 victory in Austin earlier this season. With a five-game win streak snapped by a loss to Georgia, Texas sits tied for sixth in the SEC, 8-6 in conference play. The Maroon and White are favored to win at home, with a 65% chance of victory, according to ESPN Analytics.
“Who can cut whose water off that night?” McMillan said. “I think that’s really what it comes down to this time of year.”
The Aggies will look to cut the water off from junior guard Dailyn Swain on Saturday night, as he leads the Longhorns in 5-of-6 major statistical categories. Fueling Texas’ offense, Swain leads his squad with 17.9 points per game, 3.3 assists per game and a 57% field goal percentage.
Following the competition against its in-state foe, A&M will stay in Aggieland to welcome Kentucky on Tuesday, March 3, with an evening tipoff at 6 p.m. Though not as dominant as they once were, the blue-blood Wildcats sit tied for sixth in the SEC, with a conference record of 8-6, presenting a strong competition for the Aggies.
After a one-point loss to Auburn, Kentucky looks to maintain tournament hope by breaking its three-game losing streak. Led by senior G Otega Oweh, the Wildcats aim to finish the season strong; however, it will not be easy. With games still to play against No. 25 Vanderbilt and No. 7 Florida, Kentucky could likely face a must-win scenario in College Station.
“A lot of teams wait until the NCAA Tournament, where their life is on the line, to really fight,” McMillan said. “They wait until they get in the octagon, and they’re really going to fight. Well, how did you train for the sixty days leading up to that? If you walk into the octagon and you haven’t done that, that’s an eerie feeling. To get to the NCAA Tournament, you have to have that same sense of urgency every night, that your life is on the line.”
As the regular season comes to a close, the Fightin’ Farmers will go on to face their final tests against tournament-level opponents. Blue bloods or archrivals, A&M’s life will be on the line as it prepares for the postseason.
