In The Way of #1 – Texas A&M

Photo Attribution: Icon SMI

Welcome to a new series on what must take place for Oklahoma State to reach #1 in the polls this year. Who must win in order for the Cowboys to sit atop the college football world?

Here’s your full fan’s guide to who OSU fans should be rooting for this season.

We’ve looked at Boise St.,Stanford, and Florida St. so far and now we’re heading east to look at Mr. R. Bowen and his faithful Aggie following.

A&M is kind of in the way of everything right now, including a #1 ranking in the AP poll. Of all the teams we’ve looked at though, I’m least worried about the Aggies. 1.) Because OSU plays them and 2.) because Bob Stoops is 72-2 in Norman and there’s a less than 0% chance Mike Sherman is taking his squad there a year after winning in College Station and laying the wood on their way out the door to the SEC. I’d bet Todd Monken’s contract on that game, but let’s go through the schedule anyway.

The Aggies open with SMU at home which would be good if this was 1982. They follow that up with an intrasquad against Idaho before OSU comes calling on the 24th. I’ll write about this extensively later (to the point that you’ll never want to read about it again) but I think this game sets up pretty well for for the Cowboys. Not that OSU will win, but that the -6 line in A&M’s favor is embarrassingly high.

They follow that game up with Arkansas at Jerryworld which definitely isn’t a gimme and then Tech in Lubbock. Back home for Baylor before finally leaving the state of Texas on October 22 to face Iowa State.

Yes you read that correctly, they don’t even leave the state of Texas until the week before Halloween. And this is a team vying for the opportunity to go to a conference where 7-5 will be a solid average record. Aggie math.

Then it’s home for Mizzou in a rematch of their worst loss of the year last year and up to Norman to get shellacked. I’d like to reiterate this: are we serious with only leaving the state of Texas once before November 5th? Why isn’t anyone talking about how fortuitous this schedule is?!

They finish with K-State in Manhattan and then round it out with KU and Texas at home. Think that game will be rowdy, or no?

Like I said, I’m not worried, A&M is not going undefeated. I just hope their first misstep is before October…

How worried I am: (out of 10) – yes that’s a 0.

If you haven’t checked out our other series on the 20 most important people to a 2011 national title you can do so here.