What Does Texas A&M Aggies Head Coach Think of Facing Former QB?

The Texas A&M Aggies will take on the Notre Dame Fighting Irish on Saturday night under the lights at Kyle Field .

While there are numerous storylines surrounding the game including the obvious such as Mike Elko 's first game as Texas A&M's head coach, one storyline stands out above the rest. Saturday night brings a reunion between the former Duke head coach and his quarterback with the Blue Devils, Riley Leonard , who transferred to Notre Dame after Elko left for College Station .

During his game week media availability, Elko spoke honestly about facing his former signal caller and said it's not something he wanted to have to do.

"It is interesting, weird and not really something I want to do," Elko said . "But at the end of the day, it is part of the game. I have a tremendous amount of respect for who he is, not just as a player but also as a young man. I have respect for his family. It will be three hours competing against each other, and the rest of the year rooting for him...He is a true dual-threat quarterback who can hurt you with his arm and with his legs. He presents a huge challenge."

While the obvious thought may be that Elko has the advantage over Leonard after coaching him for two years, the new Aggie head coach actually said it's the other way around.

"I would argue [Leonard] has more of an upper hand than we do. He is probably a little bit more familiar with this defense than most quarterbacks we play," Elko said . "It is not the exact defense we ran at Duke, but we do not have a ton of comfort as a program going against this offense...Two years going against a version of this defense that is similar to what he will see Saturday night probably gives him a little bit more of an advantage than it does us."

The duel between Elko and Leonard will go a long way towards determining the result on Saturday night.