The Texas Longhorns picked up a major bubble win on Saturday and beat their heated rivals in the process.

Tramon Mark scored a game-high 23 points and the Longhorns beat Texas A&M 76-70 in College Station to even the season series.

The Longhorns now move one step closer toward potentially locking up a spot in the NCAA Tournament.

Texas Defense Shuts Down Texas A&M Texas Longhorns guard Tramon Mark

Texas Longhorns guard Tramon Mark attempts to shoot a basket as Texas A&M Aggies forward Jamie Vinson (4) defends during the first half at Reed Arena. | Maria Lysaker-Imagn Images

The Longhorns held the Aggies 18 points below their season average in a much-improved defensive effort.

Swain got the scoring started for Texas with two early buckets in the paint before Mark nailed a left wing triple to put the Longhorns up 7-1. 

Mark then converted a fast-break and-1 over Jaime Vinson while Texas A&M remained without a field goal for nearly the first five minutes. Agee quickly changed that, as he hit a triple late in the shot clock that cut the lead to 10-6.

After a 3-pointer from Pope, Chendall Weaver turned a steal into a fast-break layup that resulted in another and-1 for Texas to push the lead to 16-8.

A dunk from Vokietaitis and free throws from Swain kept the Texas offense going but the Aggies responded with an 11-0 run to take their first lead of the game at 24-20 after the 6-minute mark.

Texas punched back with a triple from Swain and a jumper from Pope to take a 29-28 lead but the Aggies headed into halftime with a 30-29 lead.

Texas came out of halftime and got two buckets from Pope and Mark to take a 35-32 lead before Hill answered with a fast-break layup after poor transition defense from the Longhorns.

Mark continued his productive evening with another midrange jumper before finding Vokietaitis for an alley-oop dunk in transition that came after Pope got free for another triple.

Texas led 44-36 at 13:20 mark after putting together an 8-0 run. The Longhorns looked they were starting to pull away a bit but Hill scored back-to-back buckets to cut the lead back to 46-42, which was highlighted by a filthy spin move into a jumper.

Shortly after, Simeon Wilcher bounced in a catch-and-shoot triple that flew high off the rim before dropping in. After a fast-break dunk from Vokietaitis gave Texas a 55-48 lead at the 7:19 mark, Pop Isaacs hit a key 3-pointer for the Aggies to cut the lead back to four before the under-8 timeout.

But the Longhorns held steady. Camden Heide pump-faked himself free into an open triple before Mark nailed a tightly-contested 3 of his own deep in the corner with the shot clock running down to extend the lead to 63-56 with 3:52 to play.

After Weaver muscled his way loose for a tough bucket off the glass, Mark knocked down a pair of free throws to give Texas its largest lead of nine at 67-58.

The Longhorns were able to close things out from there to seal the win.