SAN DIEGO – The drive, both methodical and overpowering, brought Texas A&M athletic director Bill Byrne back a decade and three states to the north.

The way the Aggies' offensive line knocked back the Texas defense while quarterback Stephen McGee confidently led A&M to the winning touchdown reminded Byrne of his years at Nebraska, during which the Cornhuskers won three national titles.

The Aggies' nearly nine-minute, 88-yard fourth-quarter drive in Austin last month "was really exemplifying of where we've come from," Byrne said. And where he believes they're going.

Coach Dennis Franchione's fourth season at A&M concludes Thursday in the Pacific Life Holiday Bowl against No. 20 Cal with the 21st-ranked Aggies showing tantalizing signs of closing in on elite status. None more so than the 12-7 win at then-No. 11 UT that snapped a litany of positive streaks for the Longhorns and negative ones for A&M.

The hints of a return to national prominence came far later than many fans expected when Franchione, renowned for quick turnarounds at previous stops, was hired. And memories linger of the setbacks of the previous three years: the two losing seasons, the record blowout losses.

Byrne, for his part, insists it takes six years to fully rebuild a program – for a coach's first full recruiting class to reach redshirt senior status. The AD, who says "we're not kidding" about the Building Champions motto he brought to A&M, believes he sees concrete examples of the Aggies narrowing the gap with the best teams in the conference.

"If you can compete successfully in the Big 12," he said, "you can win national championships."

A&M was ranked No. 8 in the nation when ESPN college football analyst Chris Spielman faced the Aggies as an Ohio State linebacker in the 1987 Cotton Bowl.

"They can get [back] to that level," he said. "They're on the cusp of getting there."

Following the victory over UT with a win against Cal would be a resounding statement, Spielman added.

"It's an opportunity to push them to where they want to be," he said.

A victory Thursday, and the Aggies' one-point losses to Big 12 division champions Oklahoma and Nebraska start to look more and more like markers of a highly competitive program.

"Cal is so talented, it will be a great yardstick," said former coach Lou Holtz, another ESPN analyst. "How well they played Oklahoma, how well they played Nebraska, how well they played Texas are all pretty good yardsticks. They say, hey, they can play with anybody. They just need to do the little things to win those games."

Byrne makes clear he believes A&M was short on talent in previous years. The way to evaluate talent, he said, is how many players make all-conference and All-America teams and how many are drafted.

"We haven't had a lot of those athletes here" recently, he said, "but we're getting some now."

Most notably, he sees improvement on both lines and more speed defensively.

"Those things really level the playing field for us," he said, adding, "I watched Texas dominate us offensively and defensively on the lines previously. Now I watched us do a very good job against them."

When Franchione arrived, he emphasized the need to strengthen both lines. In the two months between his hire and signing day, he added five high school lineman recruits to the four already committed.

Of those nine, seven remain on the team; each boasts at least 12 career starts. Combined, they have accounted for 174 starts. Every one projects as a starter next year.

That would mean all but two of A&M's starters on the lines would be fifth-year seniors in 2007.

"They're kind of the nucleus of things," Franchione said, "one of the reasons offensively that we've been able to run the ball as well as we've run the ball, and defensively to maintain the line of scrimmage and get ourselves off the field."

A&M has already posted its most wins since the Big 12 title season of 1998. The Aggies are set to return 17 starters, and next year's starting lineup has a chance to be made up almost entirely of juniors and seniors.

But a far more difficult schedule awaits, with road games against Miami, Texas Tech, Nebraska, Oklahoma and Missouri promising an exacting test of how much A&M has really progressed.

Byrne senses that at least some observers in college football believe the Aggies will be a formidable force in years to come. Some officials at other schools whom he was talking to about scheduling nonconference games are suddenly less interested.

Byrne thinks A&M's gains have "scared the heck out of some opposing coaches."

E-mail rcohen@dallasnews.com

Pacific Life Holiday Bowl: No. 21 Texas A&M (9-3) vs. No. 20 California (9-3), 7 p.m. Thursday, Qualcomm Stadium, San Diego (ESPN)