Texas
National Signing Day Team Spotlight: No. 2 Texas
National Signing Day has come and gone and while the 2025 class is not finished since there is a late signing period in February as well, most of the action happened this week.
Rivals is breaking down each Top 25 recruiting class and we continue today with No. 2 Texas.
MORE LONGHORNS: Texas’ 2025 recruiting class
MORE TEAM SPOTLIGHTS: No. 1 Oregon
Steve Sarkisian and the Longhorns have been sensational in identifying and reeling in their top targets within the talented state of Texas as well as dipping into different parts of the country as well.
Texas closed on a high note bringing top-100 offensive playmaker Michael Terry on-board. Terry joins a star-studded receiving corps that includes Daylan McCutcheon, a one-time Florida State verbal who flipped, and Kaliq Lockett, a top-100 playmaker from in-state.
The Horns flipped elite four-star CB Kade Phillips away from LSU and Graceson Littleton from Clemson. They capped the week Friday when five-star Justus Terry, the No. 2 DT, picked Texas over Georgia, Auburn and Alabama.
Texas aimed to add more beef to its 2025 class late. Kyle Flood and Sark worked feverishly to flip five-star OT Michael Fasusi, who stuck with the Sooners. They also missed on five-star DE target Javion Hilson to Mizzou.
Prediction: Lance Jackson will be starting on Texas’ defensive line by the end of his first season in Austin.
There are several foundational pieces in this Texas haul that we anticipate seeing on the field in the Forty Acres before too long. Jackson’s brother, Landon, is trending to be a high draft pick in a few months and Lance boasts even more upside.
After a wildly productive past two seasons in East Texas, Jackson will enroll at Texas in January and already has the frame, explosive play style and production to be impactful before long.
No matter the accomplishments and accolades collected through the year, all seasons must come to end in some form or fashion. Unfortunately for Texas A&M football, the form of its first defeat in the College Football Playoff was in a tight 10-3 matchup with the Miami Hurricanes.
Despite of their best defensive outing of the 2025 campaign, the Aggies inability to get the offense churning until the very end of the game was among the factors that doomed their chances of advancing deeper into the national title race.
All things considered, it was a terrific season for the Maroon and White, who rattled off 11 straight wins to start the season as well as reaching the CFP for the first time in school history, which is a huge leap seeing that it was only head coach Mike Elko’s second season at the helm of the program. With that said, let’s take a look at the good, bad and ugly of the final A&M game of the year.
The Good: A precedent was set
Though the sting of a loss, especially a season-ending one, is a hard feeling to turn the page over with, an 11-2 run in Elko’s second year is a quite the feat. A&M, which hadn’t achieved 10 wins in a season in over a decade, is poised to build a long-standing prescence in the national title race.
Though a small sample size, Elko has progressed his time in each of the last two years, which can lead folks to assume that next year will have a similar outcome as far as overall success. While difficult to grasp in the moment, championship programs are not so quickly built in today’s Southeastern Conference.
The Bad: Offensive struggles spoil courageous defensive effort
In most normal circumstances, holding a team to just 10 points typically results in a victory. But that was not the case for the Aggies on Saturday. Through the better part of a three-and-a-half quarters, the A&M defense held Miami to just three points until in the final two minutes when a touchdown was conceded.
The Aggies had no answer to their defense’s heroics and came up short in the final seconds of the game when there was a chance in the end zone to tie the ballgame. A new offensive coordinator in Holmon Wiggins is due up next season, so the jury is still out on how next year will pan out.
The Ugly: Kicking the ball
Sometimes, things can be so bad that they are simply comical. That would certainly be the case in College Station on Saturday afternoon, where a windy day helped a total of four field goal attempts to be missed across both squads.
However, the Aggie faithful would be the first to say that even without wind, field goal kicking seemed virtually impossible this season. Kicker Jared Zirkel seemingly kicked the ball straight in the Hurricanes line within the 30-yard line and the Aggies only scored off a short boot from kicker Randy Bond.
ESPN’s College GameDay is pulling double duty this weekend for the College Football Playoff, airing ahead of last night’s Alabama win at Oklahoma and again this morning in College Station, Texas for Texas A&M’s opening-round game against Miami.
A pair of notorious college football legends were set to represent for their schools as guest pickers. Brian Bosworth was on hand in Norman, Okla. for Friday night’s show, while Heisman winner Johnny Manziel was set to serve as guest picker on Saturday. Evidently there’s been a change of plans with Johnny Football, as moments ago host Rece Davis former Aggies basketball star and two-time NBA champion Alex Caruso was announced as the show’s guest picker.
College GameDay has not announced a reason for the change, and has not announced it on social media.
Manziel has not comented about the change either. He shared a number of Instagram stories on Friday night from the Anthony Joshua-Jake Paul boxing match, which took place at the Kaseya Center in Miami.
Bleacher Report also promoted that Manziel was to appear on the outlet’s pregame show from Kyle Field, which livestreamed on YouTube at 10 a.m. ET. Manziel shared Bleacher Report’s Instagram post about his appearance to his stories on Friday night, but he did not appear on the Saturday show alongside Mike Golic Jr. and Ray G.
Manziel previously served as guest picker for the Aggies’ Week 1 game against Notre Dame. Caruso will be making his College GameDay debut.
Caruso is a College Station native who stayed home to star for the Aggiest basketball program from 2012 to ‘16, earning SEC All-Defensive Team and second-team All-SEC honors during his impressive college career. He left college as the program leader in assists and steals, and was the centerpiece of the 2015–16 team that made a run to the Sweet 16 of the NCAA tournament.
Caruso has gone on to become a valuable role player in the NBA. After going undrafted and beginning his career in the G League, Caruso played for the Lakers from 2017 to ‘21, winning the 2020 NBA Finals. He played in 21 playoff games, making one start during that title run, and averaged 6.5 points, 2.8 assists and 1.1 steals per game.
He continued his career with the Bulls from 2021 to ‘24, scoring a career high 10.1 points per game in his final season with Chicago. Following the 2023–24 season, he was traded to the Thunder, and was a crucial piece to the dominant 2024–25 Oklahoma City title team, averaging 7.1 points per game through the regular season and playing some of his best ball in the playoffs, with 9.2 points and two steals per game during the title run.
Caruso did not score 20 points once during the regular season for OKC, but did it twice in the Thunder’s Finals win over the Pacers, making NBA history in the process.
Oklahoma City made clear how valuable he is after the season, signing Caruso to a guaranteed four-year, $81 million contract extension.
This is a developing story. Check back for more updates.
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From the 64 teams selected to compete in the NCAA DI women’s volleyball tournament, just No. 1 Kentucky and No. 3 Texas A&M remain. Reaching the national championship is no small feat, from Dec. 4 all the way to Dec. 18, these two programs have battled to etch their names into history.
Let’s take a look on how the Wildcats and the Aggies punched their tickets to the national final.
| No. 1 Kentucky | ROUND | NO. 3 TEXAS A&M |
|---|---|---|
| Def. Wofford, 3-0 | First | Def. Campbell, 3-0 |
| Def. UCLA, 3-1 | Second | Def. No. 6 TCU, 3-0 |
| Def. Cal Poly, 3-0 | Regional semifinals | Def. No. 2 Louisville, 3-2 |
| Def. No. 3 Creighton, 3-0 | Regional finals | Def. No. 1 Nebraska, 3-2 |
| Def. No. 3 Wisconsin, 3-2 | National semifinals | Def. No. 1 Pitt, 3-0 |
👉 Check out the full schedule, scores from the 2025 women’s volleyball tournament
No. 1 Kentucky (30-2)
Big Blue fought for a dramatic five-setter victory over No. 3 Wisconsin to earn its second ever national championship appearance and first since their 2021 national title. The Badgers seemed to have all control after a Set 1 25-12 victory, but Kentucky wouldn’t be denied. Eva Hudson was on fire, accruing 29 kills on .455 hitting, while Molly Tuozzo’s back-court defense—with 17 critical digs—fought off a career night from Mimi Colyer.
No. 3 Texas A&M (28-4)
The Aggies knocked off No. 1 Pitt in three straight sets, continuing their historic season by earning the program’s first-ever national championship appearance. Kyndal Stowers powered the Maroon and White with 16 kills on .433 hitting while setter Maddie Waak orchestrated her balanced offense to an impressive .382 clip, with four different Aggies earning at least eight put-aways.
Both programs are heating up at just the right time, priming Sunday’s matchup to be an intense face-off between SEC foes. Make sure to follow the action here on NCAA.com at 3:30 p.m. ET.
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