{"id":130829,"date":"2026-01-20T20:22:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-20T20:22:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/130829\/"},"modified":"2026-01-20T20:22:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T20:22:07","slug":"texas-am-football-finishes-2025-no-8-in-the-ap-top-25-poll","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/130829\/","title":{"rendered":"Texas A&#038;M football finishes 2025 No. 8 in the AP Top 25 Poll"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Jan. 20, 2026, 1:20 p.m. CT<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\"><a href=\"http:\/\/aggieswire.usatoday.com\" data-t-l=\":b|z|k|\u2691u\" class=\"gnt_ar_b_a\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Texas A&amp;M<\/a> (11-2, 7-1 SEC) delivered a historic season that ended on a sour note but still revealed plenty of promise. Indiana put the college football world on notice by winning a national title with a former G5 coach and a supposedly \u201cless talented\u201d roster, proving that culture and development can close the gap.<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">That alone should give Aggie fans hope beyond what <a href=\"http:\/\/aggieswire.usatoday.com\/story\/sports\/college\/aggies\/football\/2026\/01\/20\/texas-aggies-football-espn-way-too-early-top-25-rankings-2026-season\/88260386007\/\" data-t-l=\":b|e|k|\u2691u\" class=\"gnt_ar_b_a\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Mike Elko has accomplished<\/a> in just two seasons. Next year will be a true test of the culture shift in Aggieland, as significant roster turnover will force the program to show whether the remaining pieces can sustain this momentum.<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">Closing the season with two straight losses wasn\u2019t what fans envisioned, but they also saw that Elko didn\u2019t sit still\u2014he made immediate moves to improve. He followed the same blueprint entering this season: recruiting speed and blue\u2011chip talent out of high school while targeting run\u2011stoppers and sure tacklers <a href=\"http:\/\/aggieswire.usatoday.com\/story\/sports\/college\/aggies\/football\/2026\/01\/16\/texas-aggies-football-transfer-portal-recap\/88205485007\/\" data-t-l=\":b|e|k|\u2691u\" class=\"gnt_ar_b_a\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">in the transfer portal<\/a>. Just as important, he retained several key contributors during one of the wildest portal cycles in recent memory.<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">On Monday, the Aggies closed the 2025 football season ranked No. 8 in both the US LBM Coaches Poll and the AP Top 25.<\/p>\n<p>AP Top 25 Poll after the CFP ChampionshipIndiana (16-0)Miami (FL) (13-3)Ole Miss (13-2)Oregon (13-2)Ohio State (12-2)Georgia (12-2)Texas Tech (12-2)Texas A&amp;M (11-2)Alabama (11-4)Notre Dame (10-2)BYU (12-2)Texas (10-3)Oklahoma (10-2)Utah (11-2)Vanderbilt (10-3)Virginia (11-3)Iowa (9-4)Tulane (11-3)James Madison (12-2)USC (9-4)Michigan (9-4)Houston (10-3)Navy (11-2)North Texas (12-2)TCU (9-4)Need a news break? <a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" data-t-l=\":body nav (play)|e|auto spike click:6|\u2691u\" class=\"gnt_ar_b_sp_a\" href=\"https:\/\/play.usatoday.com\/?itm_source=SPIKE&amp;itm_campaign=PLAYSPIKE&amp;itm_medium=ONSITE\">Check out the all new PLAY hub with puzzles, games and more!<\/a>Others receiving votes:<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">Illinois 123, Washington 76, SMU 69, Duke 58, Arizona 54, Georgia Tech 44, Tennessee 10, Missouri 8, Louisville 7, Old Dominion 3, W. Michigan 2, Wake Forest 2, Hawaii 1, Boise St. 1.<\/p>\n<p class=\"gnt_ar_b_p\">Contact\/Follow us\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/aggieswire\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\" data-t-l=\":b|z|k|\u2691u\" class=\"gnt_ar_b_a\">@AggiesWire<\/a>\u00a0on X (formerly Twitter) and like our page on<a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AggiesWire\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\" data-t-l=\":b|z|k|\u2691u\" class=\"gnt_ar_b_a\">\u00a0Facebook<\/a>\u00a0to follow ongoing coverage of Texas A&amp;M news, notes and opinions. Follow Jarrett Johnson on X:\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/WhosNextSports1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\" data-t-l=\":b|z|k|\u2691u\" class=\"gnt_ar_b_a\">@whosnextsports1<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jan. 20, 2026, 1:20 p.m. CT Texas A&amp;M (11-2, 7-1 SEC) delivered a historic season that ended on&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":130830,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[33,34,35,25337,41,37,27,29,28,36],"class_list":["post-130829","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-accessfree","tag-sstssportscollegeaggiesfootball","tag-sstsnfootball","tag-tagassociated-press","tag-tagsmg-breaking-wire","tag-tagtexas-am-aggies-football","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news","tag-typestory"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130829","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=130829"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130829\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/130830"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=130829"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=130829"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=130829"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}