Aggies Eager for Heisman Test : Holiday Bowl: Texas A&M; has had much success against trophy winners, winning three of its last four games against Heisman winners.

Your turn, Ty Detmer.

Know this: Texas A&M; doesn’t have a history of shivering and quaking at the site of Heisman Trophy winners.

Ask Bo Jackson.

Or Tim Brown.

Or Andre Ware.

In the past six seasons, the Aggies have faced four Heisman winners and stopped three of them short of victory.

Auburn and Bo Jackson were 36-16 losers in the 1985 Cotton Bowl. With the Aggies leading, 21-16, in the fourth quarter and Auburn at the Texas A&M; six, Bo was handed the ball four times in a row and didn’t make it to the end zone.

Notre Dame and Brown were 35-10 victims at the k1987 Cotton Bowl.

Last season, Ware, Houston and the run and shoot were held to a season-low total offense in a 17-13 loss at A&M;’s Kyle Field.

Oklahoma State’s Barry Sanders, now a Detroit Lion and one of the NFL’s top rushers, was the only recent Heisman success story against the Aggies. He gained 157 yards in a 52-15 Cowboy in 1988.

Now Detmer gets his chance to defend his Heisman honor against those who defense the Heisman so effectively. What do the Aggies have concocted to stop him in Saturday’s Holiday Bowl?

“We feel like we’ve got a good plan, but a plan is only as good as the guys executing it,” Texas A&M; Coach R.C. Slocum said. “We’ll have to wait and see whether it works or not.”

Executing the plan for the Aggies is linebacker William Thomas, who led the team with 13 sacks. He reads about Detmer a lot. He hears his name on the radio and sees him on television. He wouldn’t mind putting him on his back a few times and getting in on a bit of the publicity.

“I know there’s going to be a lot of people watching Detmer in this game, and if I get to him a lot, then people will be watching me,” Thomas said. “I think I can put a lot of pressure on him.”

In many ways, this is BYU’s game. The Cougars have been here nine times in the bowl’s 14 years. When they arrived at Lindbergh Field Tuesday, San Diegans kept approaching Coach LaVell Edwards and telling him how good it was go have BYU back.

Nine times. It might be cheaper for Edwards to get himself a condo at Mission Beach rather than stay in a hotel.

Texas A&M; has never played in this game. These guys don’t know Mission Beach from Mission Viejo.

“Most of our guys have never been to California,” Slocum said.

The Aggies don’t have a Heisman Trophy winner, either. Shoot, running back Darren Lewis, the nation’s third-leading rusher, finished ninth in the balloting.

On that subject, he would like to make it known that he isn’t sitting around sniveling over finishing so far back in the pack.

“I want to get that cleared up right now,” he said minutes after stepping off the plane into the USAir Hangar. “I thought I had two bad games this year, and by that happening, I can understand why I was so low in the Heisman balloting.”

So then, the offense. Texas A&M; doesn’t exactly move the ball the way BYU does. Passing attack? Funny joke. Quarterback Bucky Richardson has thrown for 847 yards. That’s about a game and a half for Detmer. (Richardson shared time for eight of 12 games with Lance Pavlas, who is considered the better passer.)

Slocum hired Bob Toledo to be his offensive coordinator before last season. Toledo, who coached at Oregon for six years, is a guy who likes to run a pro-style offense. Slocum wouldn’t mind using that offense either, and that might help attract more national recruits.

But this year, Texas A&M; has Lewis. And Richardson. This is no time to be getting too fancy. Passing at College Station this year would have been like packing a wool sweater for a summer trip to Phoenix.

“I think any coach that’s going to be worth a darn has got to adjust to his personnel,” Toledo said. “And that’s what we did. If I had my druthers, I’d want to throw the football. But it doesn’t make sense (this year).”

Texas A&M; might be meat and potatoes, but the Aggies (8-3-1) are still legitimate. They have won four of their past five, and the one loss was to No. 4 Texas, 28-27, in the last game of the regular season.

If a common opponent means anything, A&M; opened its season with a 28-13 victory at Hawaii. BYU concluded its season at Hawaii in front of a national television audience and lost, 59-28. Detmer threw four interceptions. That deflated a lot of the excitement surrounding his Heisman victory.

Lewis, who gained 1,691 yards in 291 attempts, is the focal point of A&M;’s offense, but Richardson also transports the ball efficiently. He averaged 6.9 yards in 97 carries and, Slocum says, has a great knack for turning upfield.

The Aggies have a strong, experienced offensive line that has made it a little easier for Lewis and Richardson to stockpile their impressive statistics. Center Mike Arthur was a semifinalist for the Outland Trophy, and offensive tackle Mike Pappas was a first-team All-Southwest Conference player.

Texas A&M; doesn’t slouch on defense, either. The Aggies have allowed opponents an average of 18.2 points this season, and they finished 19th in the nation in team defense. Leading this group are Thomas, chosen the SWC defensive player of the year by the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, and cornerback Kevin Smith, A&M;’s career interception leader with 18.

And finally, there is the 12th man. In case you haven’t heard the story, it dates back to January, 1922. A student named E. King Gill was helping in the press box at a game between A&M; and Centre College. The Aggies had a host of injuries, and Gill was called down to put on the uniform of an injured player and be ready in case he was needed. Actually, Gill wasn’t your average bookworm. He played on the basketball team and had been a member of the football team earlier. Anyway, Gill stood under the stands for the remainder of the game but was never put in.

Today, to uphold that tradition, Texas A&M; invites anyone from the student body to try out for the kickoff coverage team for home games. Statistically, the team has been more effective in recent years than the regular Aggies on the road, and this group was consistently good again this season.

But the members of the 12th man kickoff coverage team will only be spectators Saturday. With all the overtime hours being put in to detonate Detmer, it was decided there wasn’t time to prepare the 12th man.

Apparently, there were no hard feelings.

“They’re comfortable with that,” graduate assistant Blair Philbrick said. “Those guys are a bunch of overachievers.”

Just so the Aggies beat Detmer and BYU.