Officials at Texas A&M and Arkansas have reached an agreement to return the teams’ annual football game to Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, beginning with the 2014 season.
The agreement, announced today, extends through the 2024 season.
A&M and Arkansas met three times at the facility (2009, 2010, 2011) under a 10-year agreement to compete as non-conference opponents before A&M joined the Southeastern Conference for the 2012 season. With the Aggies’ move to the SEC, the teams’ game in College Station this season _ as well as the 2013 game at Arkansas _ were shifted to campus sites.
Both schools had expressed a desire to return the contest to Arlington once long-term SEC schedules could be tweaked to accommodate the move. In a statement, A&M president R. Bowen Loftin said returning the contest to Arlington for an extended stretch is “very advantageous for Texas A&M from a visibility and a recruiting standpoint” because of the opportunity to have an annual contest in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.
Loftin expressed gratitude to Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones for helping facilitate the date changes and hammer out the new agreement.
“We appreciate Jerry Jones and everyone in the Cowboys’ organization working with us over the past year concerning the future of the Arkansas series at Cowboys Stadium,” Loftin said. “This was a significant, unresolved issue as part of our transition to the SEC, and it was imperative for Texas A&M to play Arkansas at Kyle Field this season.”
A&M needed to play Arkansas at home in 2012 to give the Aggies a sixth game at Kyle Field as part of the team’s 12-game schedule, as well as a fourth SEC home game as part of an eight-game conference schedule.
_ Jimmy Burch
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