To say that it is desperation time for Jimbo Fisher and Texas AM would be an understatement.

They are currently in a 3-game slide, the longest such single-season streak since 2014 when Kevin Sumlin’s Aggies finished that year 7-5 before a Liberty Bowl victory over West Virginia. The current squad will have to battle hard just to reach 7 wins.

Standing at 3-4 (1-3 in SEC play), the Aggies are going to have to turn things around in a hurry just to meet bowl eligibility. They’ve qualified for the postseason in each of the past 13 seasons, despite not making a Gator Bowl invite last year against Wake Forest because of COVID-19 issues and injuries.

That streak is in serious jeopardy. Four of the final 5 opponents are from the SEC, including the next game on the schedule, which is Saturday against Ole Miss. The No. 15 Rebels tumbled 8 spots in the AP poll after suffering their first loss of the season last Saturday, thumped 45-20 by an increasingly improving LSU team that the Aggies will tangle with in the final regular-season game.

The 7-1 Rebels (3-1 in the SEC) will be looking to take it out on a down Texas A&M team that finally returns home to Kyle Field for the primetime game. Saturday’s matchup will be the first home game for Texas A&M since a Sept. 17 victory over Miami (17-9).

At least Texas A&M plays 4 of its final 5 games at Kyle Field, where the Aggies are 2-1 on the season and 23-5 since 2018. Maybe that’s why the Rebels are only a 3-point favorite, down from the opening line of 7.

Maybe returning home to the friendly confines of Kyle Field will help, as this young team goes through its growing pains and flounders at the bottom of the SEC West standings. Who would have guessed that prior to the 2022 opening kick? But that’s where Fisher finds this Aggies team heading into the homestretch.

Maybe the ball will bounce better for Texas A&M on its home turf?

Maybe the Aggies won’t hand over the first 17 points of the game without forcing the opposing offense to do much. That’s what sunk them on Saturday. A kickoff return for a score and a pair of turnovers allowed South Carolina to go up 17-0 while its offense moved the football a grand total of 19 yards.

If you just looked at the stats you would have thought the Aggies won the game rather comfortably. They piled up 2 yards shy of 400 total yards for the game, outgaining South Carolina by more than 100 yards. They nearly doubled South Carolina in 1st downs, 23-13. They held the ball for over 6 minutes more than the Gamecocks.

But the game turned on the kick return for a TD, a 59-yard interception return, a lost fumble in the red zone and 1 key stat. Texas A&M was just 5-for-14 on 3rd-down conversions while South Carolina was 8-for-16.

Youthful mistakes that can be corrected, but for now it looks as though we can expect them to continue — for how long remains to be seen.

What also remains to be seen is whether or not Conner Weigman continues at quarterback. With Max Johnson out with a hand injury and Haynes King leaving the game on Saturday with an injury, will Fisher give Weigman his first career start this Saturday vs. the Rebels?

He has nothing left to lose at this point, except a 4th consecutive game. The Aggies haven’t lost 4 straight in the same season since back in the Big 12 days when they dropped the final 4 games of 2005 to Iowa State (42-14), at No. 16 Texas Tech (56-17), at Oklahoma (36-30) and No. 2 Texas (40-29).