The TE has caught on again in College Station
JACKSONVILLE, Fla . — Junior Jace Sternberger and senior Trevor Wood reinvigorated the tight end position at Texas A&M this season under first-year coach Jimbo Fisher — perhaps second on their list of accolades this season.
The topper? A wayward reenactment of a famous picture from the Will Ferrell/John C. Reilly classic “Step Brothers” during the Aggies’ preseason photo shoot at Kyle Field.
“We kind of had a ‘Step Brothers’ joke going on the whole season,” Wood explained.
Fortunately for A&M fans, the tight ends’ execution during games is better than their mimicking of the Olan Mills-like photograph in the movie, considering the football players’ hand placement was haywire.
Fisher cares nothing about those copycat technicalities — he simply appreciates what their hands have done in reintroducing the A&M faithful to what a tight end can do for an offense, and the continued success he anticipates in Monday night’s Gator Bowl against North Carolina State (9-3).
Sternberger, who was plying his trade at an Oklahoma junior college last season, is a consensus All-American after leading the nation in touchdowns by a tight end with 10. He also leads the 8-4 Aggies in catches (47) and receiving yards (804). He has three more touchdown catches and 258 more receiving yards than anyone else on the team.
It’s quite a feat considering that last season A&M’s tight ends had zero touchdowns and seven catches all year. Then-A&M coach Kevin Sumlin played a tight end in theory, but he was more about spreading out the offense with four wide receivers and trying to overwhelm SEC defenses with speed and spacing.
Wood played last season at Arizona, where Sumlin was hired after his firing from A&M, and Wood transferred to A&M as a graduate student, knowing Sumlin’s distaste for tight ends. Wood has primarily been used as a blocker and has two catches while playing in all 12 of the Aggies’ games.
Sternberger, who started his career at Kansas before transferring to Northeastern Oklahoma A&M, was Fisher’s first recruit with the Aggies, prompting some head-scratching at the time.
“Last year we got a guy named Jace Sternberger, and I remember people saying, ‘Who the heck is that?’ ” Fisher recalled with a chuckle. “I’m glad we did.”
A&M once heavily employed the tight end under Jackie Sherrill and R.C. Slocum, among other “old school” coaches, but even those tight ends didn’t hold a candle to Sternberger, who set the school record for touchdown catches by a tight end in a single season.
Fisher, who also relied heavily on the tight end at Florida State, signed two highly sought prospects this month in Jalen Wydermyer of Dickinson and Baylor Cupp of Brock.
In describing the two, Fisher borrowed a sentiment from the Astros’ Jose Altuve, who once said, “I literally love Justin Verlander.”
“I love those two tight ends we got, I actually love them,” Fisher said. “I think they’re big-time players, I really do.”
Both tip the scales at 240 pounds, with Cupp checking in at 6-foot-6 and Wydermyer at 6-5.
Wydermyer had 42 catches for 875 yards with 10 touchdowns this season for Dickinson, mirroring Sternberger’s numbers this year at A&M.
“He can get vertical and run, and he’s a really good basketball player in high school,” Fisher said of Wydermyer. “We’re blessed to have him.”
Cupp finished his senior season at Brock west of Fort Worth with 20 catches for 492 yards with six touchdowns, in earning a Dave Campbell’s Texas Football second team all-state nod.
“You talk about size, speed, power and length,” Fisher said. “He didn’t go to any (camps), no one had heard of Baylor Cupp. He’s as good as anybody out there, but he didn’t go to all the crazy camps and promote himself. He’s just a ballplayer.
“He’s smart and tough, and those guys are hard matchups, man.”
The Aggies again will lean on their tight ends, particularly Sternberger, in trying to reach nine wins for the first time since 2013. A&M has never played North Carolina State, and the Aggies haven’t played a postseason game in Florida since the 1957 Gator Bowl.