Aggies look to make first Sweet 16 since 2018
Texas A&M has advanced to the second round of the NCAA Tournament for the second straight season after defeating Yale 80-71 on Thursday night in Denver. But unlike last season, the Aggies now have a seemingly winnable game on tap. Rather than facing 1 seed Houston like last year, the Ags face the 5 seed Michigan Wolverines, who narrowly defeated UC-San Diego on Thursday.
The two teams will meet on Saturday afternoon with a trip to the Sweet 16 in Atlanta on the line. It can also serve as some additional March Madness redemption for A&M, considering that Michigan was the team who ended their season in the Aggies’ last trip to the Sweet 16 in 2018 (that Michigan team made it all the way to the championship game before falling to Villanova).
4 Texas A&M (23-10) vs 5 Michigan (26-9)
NCAA Tournament 2nd Round
- When: 4:15 p.m. Saturday, March 22
- Where: Ball Arena (Denver, CO)
- TV: CBS
- Streaming: March Madness Live (Live TV provider login required)
- Broadcast Crew: Brad Nessler, Brendan Haywood, Dana Jacobson
- Betting lines: A&M -2.5, O/U 140.5 (per FanDuel)
Prediction time
On paper, Michigan is very similar to A&M in many ways, relying on their bigs to play stingy defense while not shooting particularly well. They do shoot better than A&M (faint praise), but they also don’t rebound as well as A&M, especially on the offensive boards. The Aggies won’t enjoy the significant size/athleticism gap they had over Yale, but one significant category that could turn this game is turnovers. The Wolverines turn the ball over more than any team in the NCAA Tournament, committing 14.1 turnovers per game (334th nationally). The Aggies, meanwhile, are one of the better teams at forcing turnovers, creating 13.39 per game (61st nationally). If those two trends play out, it could lead to a lot of empty possessions for Michigan that could help swing this game.
The Ags also enter this game with a significant rest advantage after they had an early SEC Tournament exit while Michigan played three games in three days en route to winning the Big Ten Tournament. Each of the past two seasons, A&M has been on the opposite end of this rest equation in their first-weekend NCAA Tournament exits (and A&M is 8-3 against the spread with the rest advantage this season.
Michigan is playing their 5th game in 9 days tomorrow.
Texas A&M is playing their 2nd game in 9 days.
The Wolverines played 8 guys last night, with 6 playing over 25 minutes.
The Aggies played 10 guys last night, with 2 playing over 25 minutes.
Depth will be a factor again pic.twitter.com/O4yrVxFGrX
— Luke Evangelist (@lukeevangelist_) March 21, 2025