A&M never responds to early run in 87-63 road loss at Oklahoma State
Game #3: Oklahoma State 87, Texas A&M 63
Records: Texas A&M (2-1, 0-0), Oklahoma State (2-0, 0-0)
Box Score
It’s said that basketball is a “game of runs.”
Sunday was a game of run — singular — and not because of the pace.
In an 87-63 loss at Gallagher-Iba Arena, Texas A&M (2-1) was undone by an early 9-0 Oklahoma State (2-0) run as the Aggies never responded.
Instead, A&M’s worst shooting day of the young season was magnified by an ineffective press vs. their first power-conference opponent of 2025-26.
“Not good,” head coach Bucky McMillan told the Texas A&M radio broadcast postgame. “The only thing we ask of our players is they play as hard as they can and they play unselfish. … We weren’t the hardest-playing team tonight. We weren’t, and that will get corrected.”
The lone Aggie lead of the afternoon came just 37 seconds in as Pop Isaacs drilled a 3-pointer.
However, what followed was a drought of nearly five minutes as the Aggies missed their next seven field-goal attempts.
That allowed the Pokes to assume an early 9-3 advantage that they never relinquished.
A&M got within two on Marcus Hill’s 3-pointer with 13:39 remaining in the first half, while Oklahoma State ultimately led 43-29 at halftime. The Pokes pushed their lead into the 20s shortly after the break, as it eventually swelled to 28 points in the final 82 seconds of play.
Forcing four Aggie turnovers in the first 10 minutes and 15 throughout the full 40, the Cowboys scored 27 points off A&M giveaways.
Meanwhile, the Bucky Ball formula — frantic, relentless defense, combined with sharpshooting in the lane and behind the arc — was seemingly stopped at the Red River.
“Offensively, I think we know that’s about as bad as we can shoot the ball,” McMillan said. “We may have some games where it can get out of hand a little bit when we’re not making shots, but I don’t care about that. I’m not looking at the scoreboard. We have got to find ways to get stops down (in the paint).
“We’ll get there. I do know that, but we’ve got to get there sooner rather than later, and we’ve got to learn a lot from this game.”
A&M parlayed just nine OSU turnovers into 11 points. They shot a paltry 32.3 percent from the field (20-of-62) and 25.7 percent from 3-point range (9-of-35).
For their defense to work, the Aggies must make baskets. They simply didn’t make nearly enough to be effective at either end of the floor.
Most concerning for McMillan was that A&M got bullied physically.
Oklahoma State doubled them up in the paint, 44-22.
“The problem with this game was our lack of physicality and being unable to get stops in the half-court,” McMillan said. “No physicality guarding the basketball. Driving the ball wherever they wanted to. We talked all game long. They just can’t score points in the paint.
“Twenty-seven of their 83 was from three. Everything else was in the paint. That can’t happen.”
With 14 points, Hill was the only Aggie to reach double figures, while Oklahoma State had five. Christian Coleman scored a game-high 16. Vyctorius Miller and Isaiah Coleman each had 15, with the latter falling one rebound shy of a double-double.
Spanish sharpshooter Rubén Dominguez missed his first three triples and didn’t connect until the 30th minute of the game. He and Rylan Griffen were the only Aggies to hit more than one 3-pointer on 3-of-8 and 2-of-6 shooting from deep, respectively.
Along with the early 9-0 run, Oklahoma State also enjoyed three other streaks of 7-0. A&M’s longest such stretch was an insignificant 5-0 spree early in the second half.
“What I can say to all Aggie fans is this is not what you can expect from our program, but I’m glad that this happened in one of our earlier games instead of one of the later games,” McMillan said. “I coached a team one time that lost their first game of the year by about 50 points. Looked like this. Came back, won 29 games, had the longest win streak in the country.
“I know that we’ll get this thing right.”
That team was his 2023-24 Samford Bulldogs, which made the NCAA Tournament and nearly knocked off Kansas in March.
While Sunday represented an opportunity for an early resume-booster for the 2026 edition of March Madness, it’s far from any sort of doomer.
A&M will have non-conference chances against four power opponents: vs. Central Florida (Nov. 14), vs. Florida State in Tampa (Nov. 28), at Pittsburgh (Dec. 2) and vs. SMU in Arlington (Dec. 7).
Then comes the SEC gauntlet after the first of the year.
There’s no reason to run for the hills, as there’s plenty of time for A&M to go on a run of its own.
