Trey Zuhn: Mike Elko has 'cracked down' on lack of accountability at Texas A&M

Since taking over for Jimbo Fisher, Mike Elko has started to make his mark on the Texas A&M program. A former defensive coordinator under Fisher, he is already making changes inside the locker room ahead of his first season.

According to offensive lineman Trey Zuhn, one of the biggest changes is keeping the players accountable. That goes beyond the football field, too.

Zuhn said Elko has “cracked down” on making sure the Aggies are doing what they need to do, and that’s been the biggest difference since he took over. Whether it’s making it to class or meetings, Elko is setting a high bar for his players.

“I would say Coach Elko’s stance on accountability, making sure everybody is where they need to be,” Zuhn said at SEC Media Days. “They’re where they need to be when they need to be there. If you can’t trust somebody to be in class or on time to meetings, you can’t trust them on the field. So that’s really something he has cracked down on and made a point of.”

Elko spent the last two seasons at Duke after serving as Texas A&M’s defensive coordinator. In that time, Fisher handed down multiple suspensions as the Aggies disappointed on the field, and it led to his departure. That brought Elko back to College Station, but he’s not thinking too much about what happened before he took over as head coach.

When it comes to the difference between his approach and Fisher’s, Elko said he wants to keep his eye on the ball. Instead, he’ll leave it to others to decide what’s changing under his leadership.

“We haven’t really looked back at all,” Elko said. “I think one of the things that’s important when you take over a program, you just be clear with what you’re looking for. I’ll let other people judge these differences or judge what’s different between me and Coach Fisher.

“I hadn’t spent a ton of time thinking about what’s different. I think our focus is what we want our program to look like, the culture that we want, the level of buy in and discipline and accountability that we want. And that’s kind of been where we have focused our attention.”

Mike Elko and Texas A&M will lift the curtain on the 2024 season with a high-profile matchup against Notre Dame at Kyle Field. It will not only put Elko against his former team – he was Notre Dame’s defensive coordinator in 2017 – but against his old quarterback in Riley Leonard, who played for him at Duke.