Five Questions – Baylor

By Steve Habel, Senior Editor

AUSTIN – You could barely hear the wind whipping across Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium early Saturday evening as Texas kicker Trent Domingue began his pre-kick routine for what would end up being a game-winning 39-yard field goal.[s2If current_user_can(access_s2member_level2)]

The sound of urgent, nearly primal, screams from the few thousand Baylor faithful among a throng of 97,822 fans was quickly replaced by a thunderous, approving roar and a huge exhale of relief from the home crowd. Domingue’s kick split the uprights and gave the Longhorns a come-from-behind, 35-34 victory over eighth-ranked Baylor that might be the turnaround win Texas and Charlie Strong have been searching for.

It was Domingue’s first-ever game winning kick and he was certainly the most nervous person in the stadium.

“I was extremely nervous,” said Domingue, who missed a 35-yard field goal that proved the difference in a 24-21 loss to Kansas State on Oct. 22. “As a kicker you aren’t supposed to think you can miss so I tried to rely on my confidence and right when it hit my foot I knew it was good. It feels good to redeem myself.”

The Longhorns drove 58 yards in seven plays to set up Domingue’s winning kick, with most of the drive coming on a 38-yard pass from Shane Buechele to Armanti Foreman. Baylor had a final chance to counterpunch for the win but had no timeouts. Quarterback Seth Russell was stopped on two scrambles, using most of the clock and allowing the Longhorns to hold on.

“I’m proud of this football team and what they’ve overcome,” Strong said. “They battled through the noise within the system and everything being so negative.

“I know this — I have a good team I care about and a team that cares about me,” Strong added. “It’s not a program in disarray, which many of you think, and it’s not a program that’s going backwards. It’s a program that’s headed forward.”

Texas cut Baylor’s lead to 34-32 on a 7-yard touchdown pass from Buechele to little-used tight end Andrew Beck with 7:08 to play. Backup quarterback Tyrone Swoopes, running the Longhorns’ power 18-Wheeler formation, was denied a two-point conversion run that would’ve tied the game.

Buechele passed for 291 yards, two touchdowns and one interception for Texas (4-4, 2-3 Big 12). Running back D’Onta Foreman rushed for a career-high 250 yards and two touchdowns on 30 carries, becoming the first Texas back to gain more than 1,000 yards in a season since Jamaal Charles in 2007.

“I went and hugged every one of the offensive linemen after the game because I couldn’t have done this without them,” D’Onta Foreman said. “We have to keep fighting — we have four games left and we have to go win on the road.”

Armanti Foreman, D’Onta’s twin brother, hauled in four passes for 142 yards and a touchdown. Both Foremans accounted for 392 of Texas’ 548 total yards.

Russell passed for 226 yards and two touchdowns and ran for 138 yards and another score to lead Baylor (6-1, 3-1 in Big 12 play). Terrance Williams added 180 yards on 24 carries for the Bears, and rushed for 398 yards.

Baylor outgained Texas 624-548, had 31 first downs to the Longhorns’ 19 and ran 96 plays to Texas’ 72. The Bears had more than a six-minute advantage in time of possession.

“It’s a good learning experience for us,” Baylor coach Jim Grobe said. “We’ve won a lot of games and played some of our best football in the fourth quarter, but when you have chances earlier in the game to make things happen and you don’t, then sometimes that catches you. I give Texas a lot of credit — they played great late [in the game].”

The two teams combined for four touchdowns over the game’s first five and a half minutes. Baylor scored on Russell’s opening-possession — a career-long 50-yard scoring run. The Longhorns answered with a picture-perfect 40-yard bomb for a touchdown from Buechele to Armanti Foreman to cap an eight-play, 88-yard march to tie the game at 7-7 at the 11:19 mark of the first quarter.

Texas then took the lead on a 37-yard touchdown run by D’Onta Foreman, who scored on the first snap after the Longhorns’ P.J. Locke intercepted Russell. It was the first time this year that Texas scored a touchdown off a turnover.

Baylor answered a minute and a half later on a 20-yard touchdown pass from Russell to Ishmael Zamora.

That lead held until midway through the second quarter when Baylor guard Blake Blackmar was flagged for holding Texas’ Paul Boyette, Jr. in the end zone on a passing play, handing Texas a safety and a 16-14 advantage. The Longhorns then pushed their lead to 23-14 on Foreman’s second touchdown run of the game, this one from nine yards out at the end of a six-play, 66-yard drive.

The Bears crept to 23-21 on a nifty 9-yard, back-shoulder scoring pass from Russell to K.D. Cannon with :09 to play in the second quarter at the end of an 81-yard, 13-play march that took 4:09 off the clock.

Texas got a 25-yard field goal from Domingue on the opening possession of the second half but that left some room for Baylor to re-take the lead. The Bears responded with another long march, moving 78 yards in 10 plays to a Williams 2-yard touchdown run that put Baylor up 28-26 with 8:21 to play in the third quarter.

A Chris Callahan 25-yard field goal at the 2:16 mark of the third quarter boosted the Baylor lead to 31-26. Then he hit another one — this time from 24 yards out — with 8:54 to play to expand the Bears’ lead to 34-26, still within reach of a touchdown and a two-point conversion.

“We knew the quarterback run would hurt them, and it did, but it didn’t hurt them enough,” Russell said. “We were able to connect on a few balls downfield to put us in some good field position, but for the most part we didn’t execute.”

 

Why not give the ball to D’Onta Foreman 40 times and let the opposition try to stop him?

That’s been a question over the past several weeks as Foreman grabbed the opportunity to become Texas’ top running back. And he’ll have to remain Texas’ top running threat for the rest of the season because Chris Warren III isn’t expected back this year and main backup Kyle Porter, who’s a talented freshman, doesn’t quite carry Foreman’s oomph.

“D’Onta is playing at a different level,” Strong said. “He wants to be the best back in the country, and right now he’s playing like he’s the best in the country.

“For some of those yards, he’ll get the big runs, but there’s those two or three where he has to grind it out — but that’s the way he works,” Strong added. “He practices like that. That’s what I tell guys all the time. You look at him, and he practices so hard, then he goes out in the game and he plays the way he practices. We can’t always get that effort from the other guys — I wish we could.”

Not only did Foreman run for his ninth straight 100 yard-plus game (he’s still chasing Earl Campbell’s all-time school mark of 11 consecutive games with 100 yards set in 1977), he also became the fifth Longhorn to accomplish a 1,000-yard rushing season — the first since 2000.

He even struck a Heisman Trophy pose after his second touchdown run.

“D’Onta is a big time player and it shows every week,” Buechele said. “He’s doing things that are unbelievable and he should get recognition.”

 

Which player had a breakout game and which one had a wakeup call?

The nod here for the breakout game goes to Locke, who had the aforementioned interception, a fumble recovery and one of the Longhorns’ six pass breakups in the contest.

“I’m proud of my preparation — it allowed me to make plays today,” Locke said. “We’ve come together. We never dropped our heads this game. I’m proud of my team for that. We get a stop and we expect offense to score. If the offense doesn’t score, we’re going to get the ball back.”

As far as the wakeup call, linebacker Malik Jefferson heard the alarm clock. Benched for the start of the game — along with fellow linebacker Anthony Wheeler, defensive end Charles Omenihu and left guard Patrick Vahe — Jefferson entered the fray midway through the first quarter. He played, undoubtedly, his best game since the Longhorns’ win over Notre Dame, recording a team-high 10 tackles and two sacks among his two and a half stops for a loss.

“It’s week by week, and they need to play well,” Strong said when asked about the quartet’s benching. “They were going to play, [but] it’s who starts the game. When you look at it, Malik played more than any linebacker tonight and he played well, so it was motivation for him.”

 

Have the attacks on Strong impacted the team?

Strong stepped away from his normal “we-don’t-pay-any-attention-to-that-stuff” stance to laud his team for sticking together despite all the outside “noise” surrounding the Texas program, especially when it’s struggling to win.

“As our guys battle the noise, [the talk of my job status] helps no one,” Strong said. “It’s an embarrassment to everyone. I hate it because when you’re talking about players, and the way they feel about their coach and the way their coach feels about them, and for them to have to continue to hear it.”

Strong said the “negativity” surrounding the team hasn’t found its way into the locker room.

“It hasn’t gotten in,” Strong explained, “but the thing that happens is [the players] read because they’re young and they’re social media people. They’re going to get on everything from Snapchat to whatever, and it bothers them.

“When you hear those conversations and then your parents send you text messages, ‘I’m praying for you, you have our support,’ — nobody wins in that situation,” he continued. “The drama continues to play when it doesn’t have to.”

Beck said the team continues to grow together with every practice and every game.

“One thing Coach Strong does well is tell us all the time, ‘Keep your ears in the building. I’ll take care of everything going on outside,’” Beck said. “As long as we focus on what’s happening within these walls, we’ll win like we did today.”

 

Is it time to retire the 18-Wheeler package?

Yes. Teams have figured out how to stop the Longhorns’ power quarterback run. For Texas to hang on to that package, despite its failures, is foolish. Swoopes, at times, has executed the package well, especially against teams’ whose front six or seven are relatively weak. However, teams have figured out all they need to do is blitz everyone and stop Swoopes in the backfield.

I’m still at a loss to explain the Swoopes as a running back play, which seemed like a bad idea from the start unless it was designed to fool the Baylor defense.

There were three instances in the game when Texas turned to either the 18-Wheeler package or handed the ball to Swoopes for a run that were, at best, ill-conceived. All three plays failed to pick up the necessary yardage for a first down or a two-point conversion.

 

What’s next for the Longhorns?

Texas will take its momentum on the road to Lubbock next week to play Texas Tech, which defeated TCU 27-24 in double overtime on Saturday.

“I hate that place,” Texas defensive end Naashon Hughes said. “Tech has a great quarterback and a great set of receivers like Baylor. Defensively, we just stopped a team like Tech so we should be ready for them.”

The Longhorns are 0-4 away from home this season and 5-12 in away games (and 4-8 in “true” road games) in Strong’s two-plus-year tenure on the 40 Acres.

Two of Texas’ final four games are at home, but how the team plays on the road will determine if the Longhorns are bowl eligible and Strong’s future.

“We have to build off the [win against Baylor],” Strong said. “Now it’s all about us. We [need to] go on the road, play well and eliminate all the factors and make sure that we stay focused.”[/s2If] [s2If !current_user_can(access_s2member_level2)] [article-offer] [/s2If]