Horns247 Board

During the month of June, BON authors will memorialize the final days of the UT-A&M rivalry through a series of perspectives, as seen through The Eyes of Texas, to include essays, personal reflections and commemorations of significant note.

Why? Because it is the offseason, and it is fun.

With that out of the way, let me explain what it is you are about to read. Unlike the other, extremely talented, writers of this blog, I can think only in numbers. I have no feelings or emotions, only flops and 1001101's. I cannot express myself in words, only bits and binary (the alliteration is accidental). So I'm going to stick to what I understand best -- facts and football. And I'll count on the Aggies to once again demonstrate that reality has a Longhorn bias, using cold, inalterable numbers. Beep beep boop.

Star-divide

3 --- The number of years that Texas A&M has finished in front of Texas in the Big 12 South standings. Once each in 1997 and 1998, and once, of course, in 2010. All three times A&M won or shared (asterisk! asterisk!) a part of the Big 12 South crown. You're welcome, Aggies.

2 --- The number of bowl victories for A&M while in the Big 12. Both in astonishingly meaningless bowls (galleryfurniture.com and Meineke Car Care Bowl of Texas), and against astonishingly purple teams (TCU and Northwestern). Of course, both victories were in Houston, and in fact the Texas bowl is the descendent of the Gallery Furniture bowl, as they are both played in Reliant Stadium. Basically both home games, as has been discussed here.

9 --- The number of bowl losses for A&M while in the Big 12. Like Texas in the Big 12, A&M has played many historic programs in bowl games, including Ohio State, Penn State, UCLA, Cal, Georgia, and LSU. Unlike Texas, A&M has lost to all of them. In fact, the last out-of-state bowl win for Texas A&M was in the 1990 Holiday Bowl against BYU. That was over twenty years ago (when the internet sounded like this). I was four.

4 --- The number of points by which A&M lost to Arkansas State in 2008. You know, the Arkansas State. The one that was elevated to D1 play aaaalll the way back in 2005? You've never heard of them? Geez. You probably don't even watch college football. They're only being broadcast on national TV next year. ESPN3, ever heard of it? Seriously, though, how does this happen? Is opening Saturday ever a trap game? Was A&M looking ahead to next week's powerhouse matchup against New Mexico? Worst loss for Aggie in the Big 12 era, in my opinion (although there is perhaps one other candidate).

59.8% --- The all-time winning percentage of Texas A&M-College Station. This is the second-lowest for any team in the top 25 for all time wins (Syracuse is the lowest). That is to say, the Aggies made it to the top of the wins column by being old, not by playing well. History. Tradition. Etc. And why did I point out that I'm talking about TAMU-College Station? Because...

68.1% --- The all-time winning percentage of Texas A&M-Kingsville. It's true! (yes this is completely and totally meant to be taken seriously and not at all as a joke).

1 --- The number of points scored on a safety by Texas against A&M. This is the only time this has happened. A one point safety occurs when a team kicking a PAT loses possession (i.e. if the kick is blocked) to the other team, who then runs it into their own endzone and are tackled for a safety. Getting one the old-fashioned way. Watch the video, it's worth it.

18 (ish) --- The number of Aggies currently listed on an NFL roster. "Ish" mostly because this article seems to be a bit out of date, but also because it remains to be seen how many ex-Aggies Mike Sherman will try to sign to the Dolphins roster before the end of this off-season. Rumors are that if Kenny Vaccaro signs his permission slip, Ryan Swope will try to go to Miami too.

57 (ish) --- The number of Longhorns currently listed on an NFL roster. Also "ish" for the same reason as above. This number is much bigger than 18.

Let's end on a relatively high note...

1 --- The number of national titles claimed by Texas A&M. USC contests one and there are two others that are claimed (retroactively) but we'll ignore those. One national championship to sustain nearly a century of Aggie pride. Oh did I mention this happened in 1919? Just for perspective, some things that happened in 1919:

I was negative 67 years old
The Ottoman Empire was still around
UCLA was founded
Jackie Robinson was born
The forward pass in college football turned 13 years old
The Black Sox World Series happened, and, perhaps most shockingly,
Texas A&M won a national championship in football

Kudos, in any case. What am I forgetting? Ah yes.

76-37-5 --- Now GTFO.

Did I miss anything?

http://www.burntorangenation.com/2012/6/12/3079749/gtfo-countdown-t-19-days-counting-on-aggie-football