Texas A&M Plays Hoops Too
Part of the reason Coach Mark Turgeon left Texas A&M was because he wanted to coach at a school where it was not necessary to coax people to show up for basketball games. He accomplished that goal by going to Maryland. Prior to the Aggies six consecutive NCAA Tournament appearances over the last six years, the program had never been to back-to-back NCAA Tournaments. That is pretty bad. Not Northwestern bad, but pretty bad.
But things should be different now as Coach Billy Kennedy heads to College Station. This is a team that is winning and has won for a while, at least it seems like a while to 18 year old students and athletes. I remember when they went 0-16 in conference play in 2003-2004. But most Aggie students were like 12 back then. The point is the Aggies athletics tradition is a deep one that could extend to basketball. If they win, they will come. That usually works, but it has not exactly taken full effect at Texas A&M. Can Coach Kennedy change that? Probably not, but winning the Big 12 and making more than the occasional trip to the Sweet Sixteen would certainly help.
Even when basketball takes center stage, Aggie football is always right there. Coach Kennedy had to talk about football at his press conference after being hired by the school. Well he did not have to talk about football, but he did and everybody liked him because of it. And even the “world’s longest basketball shot” has a distinct football feel to it, as you can see in this YouTube classic.
Read the in-depth men’s basketball preview for this team
