Longhorns, Aggies to renew in-state rivalry in 2024 during SEC play
Since Justin Tucker‘s field goal sailed through the Kyle Field uprights in 2011 to give the Texas Longhorns a 27-25 win over Texas A&M prior to the Aggies departing the Big 12 for the Southeastern Conference, the longtime rivals have not met on a football field. That all changes in 2024.
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The SEC officially announced Wednesday that as part of Texas’ 2024 football schedule, the school’s first as a member of the league, the Longhorns will venture to College Station to play the Aggies for the 119th time.
Texas leads the all-time series with the Aggies 76-37-5.
The 12-year hiatus between matchups isn’t the first period of time where the two programs involved in the Lone Star Showdown failed to meet. After the first meeting in 1894, a 38-0 UT win, the schools wouldn’t play again until 1898 when the Longhorns logged a 48-0 victory over the Aggies. That game still stands as the most lopsided result in the history of the rivalry.
The two teams did not play each other during the 1912, 1913, and 1914 seasons. But from 1915 to 2011, the schools battled as Southwest Conference then Big 12 rivals with odd-year matchups in College Station and even-year games in Austin.
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Texas won seven of the final 10 contests between the institutions separated by only 105 miles, including two of the last three in College Station. The effects of conference realignment which saw Texas A&M depart the Big 12 for the SEC after the 2011 season have kept the two rivals away from each other, at least on the football field. There have been several rumored near-matchups in middle-tier bowl games, with the loudest rumblings taking place in 2017 ahead of the Texas Bowl. None of the rumored meetings ever came to fruition.
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While the football version of the rivalry has been on a hiatus, Texas and A&M have met in other major sports several times. The Longhorns and Aggies have played a midweek contest in baseball every year since 2016 and even met in the 2022 College World Series with A&M winning an elimination game versus Texas. UT and A&M have met on the court for men’s basketball in both regular season games and preseason exhibitions. The rivalry has continued in other sports as well, with the recent pairing in the Austin regional of the NCAA softball tournament a notable example.
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When it was announced in 2021 that Texas would become a member of the SEC, a return of the rivalry between the Longhorns and the Aggies was one of the more captivating storylines for fans of both schools and college football at-large. Texas’ expedited departure of the Big 12 after the 2023 season made the likelihood of a matchup even more tangible for Horns and Ags alike.
In 2024, the rivalry between the two schools that has been on break for over a decade will return. No longer will the decision regarding whether the Aggies and Longhorns will meet again be in the hands of bowl executives or the SEC after the regular season has been played. The SEC made the decision to reunite the two longtime rivals in a game which will be over 12 years in the making.
