• Box score

ARLINGTON — Two days after Texas A&M blew a big lead last weekend, the Aggies celebrated the school's official entrance into the Southeastern Conference starting next year, prompting the A&M faithful to set aside its angst for a party.

Two monumental moments apparently deserved another, and Saturday's occasion is, like the first, one the Aggies would like to forget. This time, that's going to be awfully difficult with the SEC festivities out of the way.

"This is emotionally tough," A&M quarterback Ryan Tannehill said following Arkansas' astonishing 42-38 comeback victory Saturday at Cowboys Stadium. "We knew what we did last weekend, and we didn't want to let that happen again."

A week earlier, Oklahoma State overcame a 17-point halftime deficit to prevail 30-29 in the opening salvo of the Aggies' last swing through the Big 12. On Saturday, the 18th-ranked Razorbacks overcame an 18-point halftime deficit in handing No. 14 A&M two of its largest gags in history in successive weeks.

"It hurts — this is rough," A&M receiver Jeff Fuller said. "Everybody just has a sick feeling."

The latest collapse — despite 628 yards of offense by the Aggies — prompted coach Mike Sherman to say he will closely examine the Aggies' means of doing things, with a road game looming at Texas Tech next weekend.

"On the defensive side, we definitely have to shore up some things," Sherman said. "We have to look at personnel really hard and make sure we're playing the right people. We have a bunch of youngsters who are waiting to play. We'll have some heart to hearts this week about which direction we're going to go and make sure that what happened today doesn't happen again."

Both sides of the ball, however, have failed A&M in crucial situations in both games.

"We could have done a lot more on offense in the second half to control the game," Sherman said. "We had 628 yards, but at the same time we (missed) opportunities to keep drives alive."

Particularly on two instances in the fourth quarter, when Sherman chose to punt instead of go for first downs on a fourth-and-1 and then fourth-and-2. Sherman explained afterward he didn't want to risk giving his struggling defense a short field if the offense didn't make the first downs.

"That's the coach's call," Tannehill said. "That's why he gets paid the big bucks, and whatever he calls we've got to go with."

Arkansas goes hog wild

Meanwhile, the Razorbacks' offense shredded A&M's defense through the air in both halves — regardless of A&M's 35-17 halftime lead. Quarterback Tyler Wilson set a school single-game record with 510 passing yards, and receiver Jarius Wright set a school single-game mark with 281 receiving yards. Wright said Arkansas exploited a gap in the middle of A&M's defensive backfield.

"We'd seen a lot of film and noticed that they had left the middle open," Wright said. "They did it against us, and we made them pay."

Wilson's passing yards were fifth-best in SEC history, and Wright's receiving yards were second-best in SEC annals. Speaking of which, an Arkansas fan held a sign over a rail that said, "Welcome to the SEC," and late in the game Razorbacks fans chanted, "SEC! SEC!"

0-7 skid against SEC

A&M is 0-7 against the SEC since 2000.

"We're in the Big 12 right now," Sherman said when asked about the Aggies' lack of success against their future league. "We'll worry about (the SEC) next season."

A&M will try to avoid its first 2-3 start since 2008 — Sherman's first season — on Saturday night at Tech.

"Coach Sherman said in the locker room that we're going to see what kind of men we have on this team in the coming week," Tannehill said. "Who's resilient and who can come back, and who's going to tank and give in to the adversity. None of us wanted this to happen. But it did. Now we have to deal with it."

brent.zwerneman@chron.com