As the end of the regular season comes closer each day, the speculation regarding Kevin Sumlin’s future as the head football coach at Texas A&M continues to grow.
On Tuesday’s press conference, ahead of A&M’s game against LSU, Sumlin said that although he has received criticism from several different areas he will continue to strive to do what has been asked of him—win football games.
“I came here to Texas A&M to win football games,” Sumlin said. “So, what we do and how we’ve done it has been the right way, it’ll continue to be the right way. I’m in the process, right now, of working on winning this week.”
Throughout the season, Sumlin has fielded questions from reporters regarding his future at Texas A&M. The one thing Sumlin has reiterated is the importance of being able to keep the focus and have the personnel within the program trust one another.
“What this team has done is has been able to focus on what is important in this building,” Sumlin said ”As a coach or as a player, in this time, you can’t worry about what people say. What you can worry about is the response of your team and the people in this building and the trust level in there.”
When asked whether or not he thought he would return as A&M’s head coach next season Sumlin responded with a quick and confident “Yes”.
Before other questions could be answered on the topic, Sumlin’s press conference was abruptly ended. However, according to Sumlin, he has not heard from anyone within the Athletic department that would lead him to believe that his time at Texas A&M is coming to an end.
According to Brent Zwerneman from the Houston Chronicle, multiple sources have told him that Sumlin would be fired following the LSU game.
Zwerneman was also told that not even a victory— the first over LSU since A&M joined the SEC—would save Sumlin’s job.
In the last few weeks, junior wide receiver Christian kirk has been very outspoken about Sumlin. Kirk has said there is nobody else he would have wanted to play for. Looking ahead to Saturday, Kirk said the speculation not only motivates to play but to make sure they win for their coach.
“It gives you a lot of motivation, just with all the outside noise and what not,” Kirk said. “We know how much he does for us and we’re all going to be behind him 100 percent. To go out there and get that win for him… to be able to do that for him would be awesome.”
Texas A&M will travel to Baton Rouge, Louisiana to take on the LSU Tigers in the regular season finale. Kickoff is set for 6:30 p.m.