Despite a rough night in Austin, Marcel Reed and Texas A&M are still alive in the CFP hunt, with Elko confident his QB will bounce back healthy.
The last thing Texas A&M fans wanted to see in Austin nearly became their worst nightmare.
Midway through the first quarter against Texas, star quarterback Marcel Reed stayed down after a tackle during a promising Aggies drive.
He missed the rest of that possession - which ended in a tipped Jared Zirkel field goal attempt - and for a brief moment, all of Aggieland held its breath.
Then Reed jogged and cut down the sideline, came back under center the next drive, and kept playing like the competitor he's been all season.
It wasn't his cleanest night, but it was a tough, gut-check performance from a quarterback who refused to go away.
Reed finished with 180 passing yards on 20 completions and added 71 rushing yards, once again stressing a Texas defense that had to respect both his arm and his legs.
The stat line was missing the usual fireworks, no passing or rushing touchdowns for just the second time this year, and two late interceptions proved costly in the fourth quarter.
But head coach Mike Elko wasn't interested in blaming the early ankle scare.
"I don't think the ankle affected him," Elko said. "I think he still ran the ball well. Until we got to the end of the game, I felt like he was doing the things we needed him to do. I thought we didn't do a very good job of keeping clean pockets for him… We've got to do a better job with that."
Reed's final two drives ended in interceptions, one to safety Michael Taaffe with 3:41 left and another to Kobe Black just 69 seconds later, right after the Aggie defense had given A&M new life with a three-and-out stop.
It was a frustrating finish, but not a fatal one.
The loss dropped Texas A&M from No. 3 to No. 7 and kept them out of the SEC Championship Game for the second straight year, but the bigger picture remains bright.
The Aggies are still solidly positioned above the cutline for the 12-team College Football Playoff and are expected to hear their name called on Selection Sunday.
Now it's about recovery, refocus, and letting a battle-tested quarterback lead the charge. If Marcel Reed is fully healthy, and Elko clearly believes he will be, Texas A&M will be an absolute handful for whoever lines up across from them in the postseason.