On Saturday night, Jeff Tarpley of 247Sports reported that Texas A&M was set to hire Kentucky head coach Mark Stoops to replace the fired Jimbo Fisher as head football coach.

However, conflicting reports have since declared that Stoops won't be hired by the school:

Brent Zwerneman @BrentZwerneman

I will add this: Any reports that say Mark Stoops to Texas A&M is a done deal are premature and inaccurate.

Matt Jones @KySportsRadio

BREAKING:<br><br>I am told by a very good source that Mark Stoops is staying at Kentucky

Pete Thamel @PeteThamel

Kentucky's Mark Stoops will not be the next Texas A&amp;M coach, ESPN can confirm.

Stoops himself took to X to refute the reports:

Mark Stoops @UKCoachStoops

I know there's been much speculation about me and my job situation the last couple of days. It's true I was contacted about a potential opportunity this weekend, but after celebrating a big win against our rivals with players I love like family, I knew in my heart I couldn't…

Stoops, 56, has gone 73-64 in his 11 seasons at Kentucky, including a 7-5 record this season. It's been a strong run at a school famously more invested in the basketball program.

As for whether the potential hire would have been the right move for a Texas A&M program where the expectations often unrealistically ignore the realities of life in the loaded SEC, that was met with mixed reaction on social media:

Dan Wolken @DanWolken

Mark Stoops is a good football coach. This is probably not a good hire. Those two thoughts can co-exist. <a href="">

Barrett Sallee 🇺🇸 @BarrettSallee

I'm fully on board if Texas A&amp;M hires Mark Stoops. He doesn't put up with any crap and can develop. A&amp;M fans probably don't want to hear it, but it needs to be a developmental program instead of thinking it is a superpower.

Robert Behrens @rcb05

I'm not going to tell you to get pumped over hiring Mark Stoops. I'm just gonna remind you that the correlation between a hire being popular and a hire being successful isn't particularly strong.

Aaron Murray @aaronmurray11

Texas A&amp;M spending $75 million to fire Jimbo Fisher to then bring in Mark Stoops?<br><br>I like Mark Stoops… but I would be pissed if I was an Aggies fan. Doesn't seem like much of an upgrade

Bill Connelly @ESPN_BillC

If the Mark Stoops-to-A&amp;M thing is true,<br><br>A. He's obviously a good coach, it's probably fine.<br>B. His offenses have been stolid and kinda retrograde for 3 of the last 4 years, which makes me fear he's just Normal Jimbo.<br>C. But it's probably fine.<br>D. I'd have just hired Traylor.

Sean Pendergast @SeanTPendergast

Paying $76 million in a buyout so you can go hire Mark Stoops? Okay then <a href="">

One thing that Stoops would have had in College Station, compared to his time in Lexington, asw more resources. He lamented Kentucky's lack thereof during an October radio appearance following a 51-13 stomping at the feet of two-time defending national champion Georgia.

"I can promise you—Georgia, they bought some pretty good players," he said (h/t ESPN). "You're allowed to these days, and we could use some help. That's what they look like, you know what I mean, when you have 85 of 'em. I encourage anybody that's disgruntled to pony up some more."

Stoops somewhat clarified his remarks the next day.

"Basically one person was questioning me and the program and getting over the hump," he said. "I really simply should have said, 'Hey, dude, I've gotten over a lot of humps. That's not a hump, that's Mount Everest.'"

The expectation at Texas A&M is that you summit those peaks. Jimbo Fisher never came close, registering a 46-25 record and just three bowl appearances in parts of six years.

The question would have been whether Stoops could have gotten closer to meeting the expectations of Aggies' fans.

"This is not an 8-4 job. It's not," athletic director Ross Bjork said on the Aggie Fan Zone radio show in November (h/t Brent Zwerneman of the Houston Chronicle). "Because of the decision we made (to fire Fisher) but also because of the resources and expectations. Does somebody have the wherewithal to deal with that, the weight of (the job) and the magnitude, and not get fazed and rattled, not panic, and if something doesn't go right, they fix what they need to fix?"

It's a moot point now, as Stoops appears set to remain with the Wildcats, leaving the Aggies to continue their search.