Which Team (Or Coach) Is Texas A&M's Biggest Villain For the 2025 Season?

The Texas A&M Aggies are hoping to make Mike Elko's second year even more memorable than the first year and, of course, avoid the end-of-year collapse that haunted the team in November of 2024.

After a loss to the Notre Dame Fighting Irish at Kyle Field to start the year, the Maroon and White embarked on a seven-game win streak that culminated in a thrilling win over LSU that officially saw Marcel Reed take over as "the man" in Elko's system.

And now with Reed fully at the helm and the big pickups during the offseason, the Aggies are priming themselves for a College Football Playoff run that will include some difficult road trips throughout the year.

One Coach Stands in the Way of A&M's Quest: Steve Sarkisian

Unfortunately for the Aggies, there lives another well-known football coach about 90 miles west of College Station that will look to put a twist in the road of the Aggies' playoff hopes just like he did in the 2024 season.

Texas Longhorns head coach Steve Sarkisian.

Thursday morning, ESPN published their list of the "Anticipated Archvillains for Every Top 25 College Football Team," and the person next to Texas A&M on the list was none other than the former Nick Saban student himself.

And there's no doubting that Sarkisian has earned that spot, he is the head coach for the Aggies' biggest rivals and has done a fine job of turning the football program in Austin around since he was hired there in 2021.

Not to mention, the former USC and Washington coach led the Longhorns to a very successful first season in the Southeastern Conference, which included the team marching into a rowdy Kyle Field on November 30 and silencing the six-digit crowd with a 17-7 win over the Aggies, effectively squashing any playoff hopes that the Maroon and White were hoping after the season's end.

As for Sark and the Horns, they made it back to the College Football Playoff semifinals for the second year in a row but would come up short to the eventual national champions, the Ohio State Buckeyes.

And to make matters worse for the Aggies, they have to travel to Austin this year to play Texas, where the Arch Manning hype is through the roof both in the state capital and in the college football world, and come November 28, the biggest villain for the Texas A&M Aggies could be all of Darrell K. Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium.