The No. 7 LSU Tigers (9-3) and the No. 22 Texas A&M Aggies played an exhilarating, overtime thriller in College Station, Texas. The Aggies (8-4) won 74-72 in game that required seven overtime periods to reach a conclusion in the highest-scoring game in FBS history.
The Aggies picked off a Top 10 team and one of the premier teams in the SEC.
Free Football
LSU and Texas A&M did not set out to be the Game of the Year, but it ended up that way. On the final play of regulation, Aggies QB Kellen Mond connected with WR Quartney Davis on a 17-yard touchdown strike. Texas A&M kicked an extra point to tie the score at 31. The game headed into overtime.
“You had two teams out there refusing to lose and we just made one more play,” Texas A&M coach Jimbo Fisher said.
The Aggies were led to victory by Mond. The sophomore QB threw six touchdowns for 287 yards. He also added three 2-point conversions and rushed for another touchdown.
“We showed as a team that we’re never going to quit, and we did that for four quarters and way more,” Mond said.
In a losing cause, LSU’s QB Joe Burrow threw three touchdowns and 270 yards. Burrow also rushed for 100 yards and three more scores.
Kendrick Rogers Neighborhood
Aggies wide receiver, sophomore Kendrick Rogers, caught only three balls, but two of them were touchdown scores. Rogers added three 2-point conversions in overtimes, including the game winner.
Players on both squads were fighting cramping issues in the extended overtime periods. Rogers, in particular, fought back cramps. The training staff worked on him in the seventh overtime. Rogers returned to the field in time for the winning 2-point conversion.
“These are moments you live for, so no matter what’s going on with your body you want to be out there,” Rogers said. “So, you just have to talk yourself out of it, just mentally fight through it.”
Seventh Overtime
The seventh overtime session tied an NCAA record for most overtimes in a game.
“I lost track of overtimes,” said a stunned Fisher. “It is the craziest game ever.”
“The momentum kept on changing both ways and the guys responded,” said LSU coach Ed Orgeron. “That was one heck of an overtime; we just fell one play short. Our guys have nothing to be ashamed about. They fought hard.”
Tempers flared on both sidelines. The refs favored the Aggies all night in an old-fashioned home-cooked game by the officials. LSU did not catch any breaks. The animosity spilled onto the field when the game ended.
Hilary Scheinuk, a photographer from a local newspaper in Baton Rouge, Louisiana captured two opposing staff members getting into fisticuffs. Kevin Faulk, LSU’s director of player personnel and a former NFL player, and an unknown staffer from Texas A&M were involved in a post-game altercation.
POSTGAME | #LSU director of player personnel Kevin Faulk and an unknown man with what appears to be an #Aggie bench credential throw punches on the field after @AggieFootball defeated @LSUfootball in 7-OT @theadvocatebr pic.twitter.com/H7EvCNmoIv
— Hilary Scheinuk (@hscheinukphoto) November 25, 2018
Hope You Bet the Over
When the dust settled, the two teams combined for 146 points. The consensus closing over/under total finished at 42 points. The actual over hit at the start of the fourth quarter.
LSU’s defense gave up 74 points, which set a record for most points allowed by a ranked team.
The final score represented the highest-scoring game in FBS history. It’s actually the second-highest scoring game in collegiate football history. In 2008, Abilene Christian and West Texas A&M combined for 161 points. Abilene Christian won the turbo-charged game by an astonishing score of 93-68.
