Ugh

I've seen, listened to, or simply read the post-mortem of many terrible Aggie games in my time.

The Texas Tech game in 2002, an overtime loss 48-47 caused by two missed extra points (one to send it to overtime and one to lose in overtime), stands out for me because when I was yelling as part of the Twelfth Man, I'd usually lose my voice a little bit the next day; after that game it was gone for most of the week. But that was a loss of the "heartbreaker" variety--it hurts because your team was so close to winning instead of losing.

Just last year, there was the Arkansas State game, where we got beaten by a team that we really should have outclassed. That was an "unpleasant surprise" loss, because there shouldn't have been a reason to doubt that your team would win.

But of course, there was also the King of Hideous Aggie Losses: Oklahoma '03. That game lives in infamy among Aggie fans as "0-77." That's one that experts agree falls into the category of "humiliating."

So where in the Horrible Aggie Loss pantheon does last night's humiliating surprise in Manhattan belong?

Look: I wasn't wrong about K-State being bad. They're real bad. Two of their wins are over FCS (I-AA) teams--nobody else even schedules two FCS teams, because only one counts as a real "win" when it comes to being bowl-eligible. Their other win before last night was by one over perennial Big XII bottom-dweller Iowa State. As for their losses, they managed to lose to a cupcake Louisiana Tech team, only put up three field goals against the mediocre UCLA, and got destroyed by Texas Tech. They are who we thought they were.

And this is why I'm not "angry," per se, about what happened when the Ags played K-State yesterday. I'm . . . I'm super confused.

I don't believe that that game was representative of who the '09 Aggies are, either. They took care of business against non-BCS teams, and they lost to their two previous BCS opponents, which is exactly what I expected. The loss to Arkansas was pretty bad (although the Ags put together an OK first quarter), but it turns out that Arkansas is pretty good. Did you notice they were within reach of beating Florida yesterday? They were. And even considering the big-name players Oke State was missing, the Ags' performance against them was surprisingly good.

So what turned last night's game int a swirling vortex of horror? A few things to consider: it was the Aggies' first true road game, which might have been unnerving for a team as young as they are. It was a little colder than they're used to . . . maybe that hurt? The Wildcats were playing with hurt feelings after their Tech beat-down, so they probably took it out on the Ags. And maybe our special teams just aren't any good--most of what went wrong for the Aggies, if it wasn't about turnovers, was caused by bad field position.

But, to be honest, I think a lot of it was luck. Luck is always important in football; usually it splits about 50-50, but sometimes one team is demonstrably luckier than they other team, and so wins the game. Last night, the luck was 100% in K-State's favor and 0% for A&M. They started the game making weird mistakes and having things go totally wrong, and it just didn't stop.

I read a blog entry last night entitled "In the name of all that is decent, how can Texas A&M go on?" It's a pretty fair assessment of how awful that game was, until the end where he decides that the A&M team has given up on the season. Obviously, the Ags gave up at some point last night. With how badly the game started, I can't even blame them. But it's too soon to say they've given up on the whole season. Even if you disagree with my luck theory, it's clear that last night's game was an aberration. Now, the Ags may yet give up on the season, I don't know. (The temptation may be all the greater if the Texas Tech game is equally horrible, which given that it's Tech, is very very well could be.) We won't know, though, until we see how and if they recover going forward.

My verdict is that the K-State game of '09 was worse than every other loss that's happened since I've been following Aggie football--except for Oklahoma '03. That's right, second-worst. But I remain cautiously optimistic that the '09 team will bounce back better than the '03 team did.