Yes, we would all want a 5-0 record. Let's look at this from a process-oriented perspective, though. What are the things, regardless of record, that you want to see out of the team over the next 5 games? What would give you more confidence as March approaches?

I'll start:

- A Marcus Hill game. I think he can be an X factor come March. I want to see a type of performance like I heard about from the scrimmage.

- Protecting the basketball. I see improvement here already and now I want to see consistency.

- Playing within ourselves against other high-paced teams. We've sped up or disrupted slower paced teams. I want to see how this team plays against a Georgia or Vandy.

- Bigs step up. Florida has some monsters. Need more out of Vinson and Fede. They don't have to be world-beaters, but would be huge if we can get 10-15 solid minutes from each.

nelsonagholor said:

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I wanna see our half court defense look solid. We know there will be games where a teams breaking the press, and we'll have to be able to win in the half court to win those games

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Yeah we're #1 in the SEC in defense in a couple of categories but can we sustain that to some degree against better competition?

Stats you didn’t think you’d see 2 months ago:

Through 7 conference games, Texas A&M has the No. 1 defense in the SEC on KenPom 📈

▪️Defensive efficiency - 105.8 (1st)
▪️Turnover % - 19.2 (1st)
▪️eFG% - 48.0% (2nd)
▪️Steal % - 11.2% (3rd)
▪️3P% - 30.2% (3rd)
▪️2P% - 49.8% (4th) pic.twitter.com/o8sMZd8TIm

— Luke Evangelist (@lukeevangelist_) January 25, 2026

- An important thing I want to see is if we can lower the foul count. We've gotten a little better at it but I'm more so talking about those lazy reach-ins that we still have a bad habit of doing.

- On defense, trapping the ball handler in the press more. Try to find more vantage points to bait these opposing guards into and trap trap trap. Teams really go dead in the water and the chances of us creating turnovers is much higher.

- On offense, find some more creative ways to buy Ruben space on the perimeter. State was the only team that was fully committed to shutting him down all game, but we didn't do very much to get him free

- Can we continue to compete in games where we figure to be at a big disadvantage on the boards: We did pretty well at this against Tennessee, Auburn and Texas, can we continue do it against Florida and Alabama? Alabama's numbers aren't huge here but since they added Bediako back in they figure to get better at it and Florida is right there with Tennessee for being the best in the country at it.

- Can we be efficient against fellow tempo teams: You mentioned this but this is something we just haven't really seen yet. It's one thing to drag a team into our style of basketball, how do we do against teams that want to play that way? The fastest team we've played so far is Oklahoma State and they shredded us, but I think we can all agree we were a different team back then. We haven't really faced a good tempo team since then (we've faced some bad ones like Florida State and PV), but Arkansas, Georgia, Florida, Alabama and Vandy are all fast teams.

- Can we get better scoring at the basket? In conference games we're only shooting 56% on close twos which is not very good. Feels like we've left some points on the board that are going to matter a lot more in this next stretch of games.

First a shout-out to the OP, buckyball34. From your early posts, you've brought a wonderful insider's perspective on Bucky. You obviously enjoyed playing for him at Mountain Brook and are rooting for his success here in Aggieland. It's good to see you using words like "we" and "ourselves."

As for what I'd like to see as we face stronger competition these next five games, I'll stick to individual player performance:
- Rylan Griffen is an intriguing player and has become one of my favorites. I don't know the backstory on his choosing A&M for his final year of college ball vs. staying at Kansas. Assume it had more to do with increasing his NBA stock than coming home to Texas. So far, so good. How he performs over these next 5 games will provide another strong indication on whether it was a wise decision.
- Ruben Dominquez had a great start to the season against mostly weak competition. He then fell off quite a bit and, like everyone else, I wondered if he simply wasn't quick enough to get his shots. Maybe it was more about gaining familiarity with the system as we now have seen spurts where he's again bringing that much needed 3-point threat. I'd like to see that continue.
- We all were surprised by the breakout game Zach Clemence had against South Carolina. Bucky must have seen something to bring him here to A&M after 3 unproductive years at Kansas. Am thinking it was his 3-point shooting potential (vs. his rebounding prowess - sarcasm alert). Of course, the question is whether that USC game was a one-off. Am hoping he has at least one more 5+ 3 point scoring game this year. It's probably too much to ask for that over these next five games. But, you gotta dream.
- Jamie Vinson and Federiko Federiko. We obviously need better play from our bigs. Have seen flashes from Vinson but very little from Federiko. I just checked the boxscore for the USC game. They played a combined 9 minutes with a total of 2 points and 2 rebounds (all from Vinson). What about half of a combined double-double, i.e., the two of them combining for 5+ points and 5+ rebounds, in one of these next five games? Vinson should be able to do that by himself. Right?

I dunno why Griffen left KU . He was 3rd in mins played among KU guards last yr and 4th in points scored . Maybe looking for more PT & maybe younger players taking PT? Glad he did tho.