August 30, 2003
Postgame notes and quotes from Texas A&M's season-opening 26-11 win over Arkansas State on Saturday at Kyle Field...
TEXAS A&M POSTGAME NOTES
PEGRAM PERFECT ON FIELD GOALS --- Sophomore placekicker Todd Pegram (Plano, Texas/Plano West HS) booted four field goals on four attempts, tying for the third-most in school history. The last time an Aggie made more than four FGs in a single game was Alan Smith, who made a school and Southwest Conference six three-pointers against Arkansas State in 1983 at Kyle Field. Pegram has made six straight field goals dating back to last year and connected on 15 of his last 17 attempts.
MURPHY HAS BIG DAY ON RETURNS --- Junior Terrence Murphy (Tyler, Texas/Chapel Hill HS) had two kickoff returns for 135 yards, the fourth most in a game in school history and the most since Leeland McElroy had 181 yards against Rice in 1993. Murphy's returns of 58 and 77 yards were both the longest by an Aggie since Chris Taylor returned one 84 yards at Oklahoma State in 1998. The last time an Aggie had a longer return at Kyle Field was Sirr Parker with a 78-yarder against Iowa State in 1997. Prior to tonight, Murphy had one career kickoff return for 19 yards (2001).
SEVEN AGGIES MAKE STARTING DEBUTS --- There were seven first-time starters in the Aggies' lineup against the Indians --- four on offense and three on defense. Making their starting debuts were: offensive guard Aldo De La Garza, center James Milkavich, offensive tackle Alex Kotzur, tight end Taylor Schuster, defensive tackle Johnny Jolly, defensive tackle Brian Patrick and safety Ronald Jones.
Also making his debut in the Aggie lineup was punter Jacob Young, a non-scholarship junior from Fairfield, Texas. Young put both his efforts inside the 20-yard line and averaged 59.5 yards per boot. The school record (minimum of five punts required) is 57.2 by Shane Lechler vs. Texas Tech in 1999.
ABOUT THE CROWD --- Attendance for Saturday's game was 75,804, the largest season-opening home crowd in school history. The previous best was 75,087 against Louisiana-Lafayette last season. It was the 18th straight 70,000-plus crowd at Kyle Field. Prior to the beginning of the streak in 2000, A&M had produced a total of 13 70,000-plus crowds in school history.
FOR THE RECORD --- Game captains for the Arkansas State contest were: sophomore Jaxson Appel, junior Terrence Murphy, senior Alan Reuber and senior Sean Weston ... the 12th Man team representative was Blake Kendrick, a junior from Willis, Texas (Willis HS) ... redshirt freshman running back Courtney Lewis rushed for 74 yards on 13 carries and scored two touchdowns in his debut, including a 42-yard romp in the fourth quarter ... Sophomore Jaxson Appel's third-quarter interception was the fifth of his career ... the Aggies have won 16 straight home openers since a 17-3 loss to LSU to start the 1987 season.
COACH FRAN WINS DEBUT --- Coach Fran is 15-5-1 in season openers in his career. In debut games, Coach Fran is 5-1-1 (seven schools). A&M coaches are 17-8-1 in debut games. Starting his 21st season as a college head coach, Coach Fran's career record improves to 156-73-2.
TEXAS A&M POSTGAME QUOTES
Quarterback Dustin Long: "Anytime you come out in your first game with a new offense, you have to be patient. We made a bunch of mistakes and we know we have to get better. We have to do a better job when we get in the red zone of getting the ball into the endzone. But it helps when you have a kicker like Todd who can hit it from 40 yards in."
Quarterback Reggie McNeal: "A win is a win. No matter how ugly or pretty it is. We know we can execute better. We'll just go back to practice and work to get better each week. (on late scoring drive) We were just trying to run out the clock and score if we could. We were glad to put more points on the scoreboard and put the game out of reach."
Placekicker Todd Pegram: "(Coach Fran) was pretty intense to say the least. He told us this is our first game and the biggest person to beat was ourselves. At halftime, he told us it would come down to the fourth quarter. This is our first game and we didn't expect to blow them out. (On first field goal) We had our backs to the wind and I knew time was running out in the first quarter. I tried to tell coach to call a timeout so I wouldn't have to kick it into the wind. Kicking into the wind does funny things to the ball."
Coach Dennis Franchione: "I thought we made some plays but we had some unfortunate turnovers. Some of the plays didn't work out the way we wanted them to. Both quarterbacks are so close at times that it makes it difficult, but it's a good problem to have. This will be a night I'll remember for a long time. I felt like we might need Reggie's scrambling ability at the end of the game and he did scramble for a first down. The kicking game was big for us tonight. It got us down there where we could get some points. We didn't get the touchdowns in the red zone, but Pegram did a good job coming in and getting us some points."
ARKANSAS STATE POSTGAME QUOTES
Coach Steve Roberts: "Field position was key. It's hard to drive 97 yards when you're down. They played hard and they played for 60 minutes. Defensively, we had some big plays and our touchdown was key. Individuals played well and I'm proud of their effort. I'm proud of the offense. They were able to maintain and get key first downs. We were real close to breaking some plays open, but we weren't able to and A&M had a lot to do with that. I was proud of our kicking game. We played a lot of young guys. Terrence Dunbar is a tremendous player. He put forth great effort tonight. (On kicker Jarod Little) He had some good punts but was inconsistent. He was the only freshman who played tonight and we're real proud of him. Overall, we're proud but we didn't come here to be proud; we came here to win."