COLLEGE STATION, Texas -- While Baylor is pushing an email campaign to preserve the Big 12 Conference and rivalry games in the state, Texas A&M said Friday that the Bears purchased only 830 tickets from a possible allotment of 3,850 for their Oct. 15 football game at Kyle Field.
Those figures were released by Texas A&M, whose departure from the Big 12 to a pending spot in the Southeastern Conference is on hold after Baylor and other schools refused to waive their right to sue over such a move.
Baylor said later Friday that it had requested 2,000 tickets for the game by July 1, the deadline set by the Big 12.
"Earlier this week, based on tremendous demand, Texas A&M asked for Baylor to return tickets it did not expect to sell, and we returned 750 tickets as a courtesy," Baylor spokesman Nick Joos said in a statement. "Many of our fans have indicated that they acquired tickets from third-party sources since the seat locations available are superior to the back corner end zone location provided to visiting teams at Kyle Field."
Texas A&M said that Idaho, with 264, was the only opposing team that will play at Kyle Field this year that purchased fewer tickets from the Aggies than Baylor, whose Waco campus is less than 100 miles away. Texas was the only team to keep its full allotment of 3,850 tickets available to all visiting teams. SMU took 1,988 tickets, followed by Kansas (1,750), Missouri (1,600) and Oklahoma State (1,428).
Texas A&M said those figures do not include bands and other complimentary seats.
Baylor said the tickets it kept included seats for its band and family members of players and staff.
Texas A&M was prepared this week to announce its entry into the SEC, but that league's unanimous approval of the Aggies becoming its 13th member came with the condition that all legal issues had to be cleared up.
Oklahoma State president Burns Hargis told The Associated Press on Friday that his school has "no intention of filing suit against the SEC or anybody else."
Hargis described the situation surrounding the Big 12 as very complicated.
"Honestly, I don't think anybody knows what's going to happen. I really don't," Hargis said. "I do think everybody would like the conference to stay together, but I don't think anybody knows because you've got 10 teams and everybody's got their own ideas about what's best for their institution. It would be impossible, I really think, for anybody to predict accurately what's going to happen at this point."
Hargis said he tried to get Texas A&M to stay in the Big 12.
Oklahoma president David Boren said last week that multiple conferences have expressed interest in the Sooners and he expects a decision within a few weeks on what his school will do. That could be a move to the Pac-12 with Oklahoma State, which could have happened last year, or remaining in a revised Big 12 that would then likely look for a team to replace the departing Texas A&M.
On Baylor's main university website is a link for the school's alumni and fans to "Rise Up For Texas Football." The page includes a letter saying that football is "the fabric of this great state" and asks if Texans will "stand by and watch hundred-year-old rivalries be cast aside as the state's largest universities align themselves with other states across the country."
There is even a suggested message to send to the presidents or chancellors of Texas, Texas A&M and Texas Tech with links to their email addresses included.