OXFORD, Miss. – A shotgun start turned into a defensive slugfest Saturday night at Vaught-Hemingway Stadium, with Texas A&M (7-4, 4-3 Southeastern Conference) grinding out a hard-fought 31-24 win over Ole Miss (5-6, 2-5 SEC).
“Anytime you go on the road in the SEC and win, you’ve got to be happy about it, particularly in the West,” A&M head coach Kevin Sumlin said. “We weren’t perfect, but I thought our guys played really hard and I’m happy for them.”
Junior kicker Daniel LaCamera redeemed himself on an earlier miss by making an 18-yard field goal with 1:59 to go in the game, giving the Aggies a comfortable seven-point lead. The field goal was the lone offensive score in the second half on either side.
“Kudos to our defense, our defense put us in a great situation for us to be able to go out there and execute,” sophomore running back Trayveon Williams said. “It was great for our offense to drive it all the way down the field … we finished and got the points that we needed.”
In a last-ditch effort, Ole Miss was unable to conjure any heroic efforts, and sophomore cornerback Charles Oliver broke up a pass on fourth-and-2 with 1:14 left to secure the win for Texas A&M. In the second half, the Rebel offense was limited to just 66 total yards.
“They gave us a chance to try to tie that game there at the end and they did a nice job stopping the run all night,” Ole Miss head coach Matt Luke said.
While the Aggie defense struggled at times, the early second-half disruption of quarterback Jordan Ta’amu paid off. The junior made an errant throw while flustered in the pocket, and A&M safety Derrick Tucker stepped in front of the pass, taking it to the house 19 yards for a pick-six, giving the Aggies their first lead of the night, 28-24.
“The pick-six he got, that was big in the game,” fellow safety Armani Watts said. “It was just what we needed.”
A&M and Ole Miss traded touchdowns on each team’s first two possessions of the game. The offensive outburst led to a 14-14 tie at the 4:17 team mark of the first quarter. The two teams combined for 290 yards in the first 11 minutes of the night.
After nearly 15 minutes of stagnant action, Ta’amu found Braylon Sanders coming across the field underneath coverage for a 30-yard touchdown pass, giving the Rebels a 21-14 lead with 4:24 before the half.