Five Questions – Texas Tech

By Steve Habel, Senior Editor

LUBBOCK, Texas — It’s never easy to win on the South Plains, and Texas needed all that star running back D’Onta Foreman and the defense could muster to get it done against Texas Tech. That effort pushed the never-say-die Longhorns to a 45-37 victory over the Red Raiders on Nov. 5 on a cool and overcast afternoon at Jones AT&T Stadium. [s2If current_user_can(access_s2member_level2)] 

Foreman made the difference. He ran for 341 yards on 33 carries and scored on runs of 4, 38 and 74 yards. He became the first Longhorn player to rack up 300-plus yards on the ground since Ricky Williams amassed 350 yards against Iowa State in his Heisman Trophy season in 1998.

With all Foreman accomplished, it was barely enough for the Longhorns to garner (5-4, 3-3) the victory.

Texas Tech (4-5, 2-4) used a 9-yard Da’Leon Ward touchdown run after a Texas fumble to close the gap to 45-37 with 10:50 to play. After the two teams traded failed fourth-down conversions deep in Texas Tech territory in the final four minutes, the Red Raiders drove to the Texas 20 in the final minute.

But on third down, quarterback Patrick Mahomes II was forced to scramble to his left and lofted a pass to the end zone that was intercepted by the Longhorns’ Kris Boyd, cementing the Texas win.

“I wanted the game to fall on the defense because it’s a confidence builder for them to make a stop,” Texas head coach Charlie Strong said. “You look at this team and how resilient they are and how they continue to battle — even though things may go against them, someone [still] steps up and makes a play.”

Mahomes threw for 367 yards and three touchdowns while leading the Red Raiders to 482 yards of total offense on 100 plays. Texas countered with 658 yards of total offense, with 244 yards and two touchdowns coming from freshman quarterback Shane Buechele.

This one was the back-and-forth offensive show that fans expected, along with a handful of mistakes and a bevy of big plays thrown in for good measure.

Texas Tech landed the first blow on its opening offensive possession with a 3-yard Mahomes-to-Cameron Batson touchdown pass. The play marked the sixth time in nine games the Longhorns gave up a score before their offense could take the field.

Texas responded with a 4-yard scoring run by Foreman three plays after a 52-yard pass from Buechele to Jake Oliver on the Longhorns’ first offensive snap.

The Red Raiders retook the lead on a 42-yard field goal by Clayton Hatfield when their next drive stalled at the Texas 25. The Longhorns’ defense turned up the heat on Mahomes during the possession, bringing blitzes on seven of the nine snaps.

Texas took the lead on an arching, 16-yard pass from Buechele to fellow freshman Collin Johnson. Texas Tech defensive back D.J. Polite-Bray, who’s listed at 6-feet, never had a chance against the 6-foot-6 Johnson. Trent Domingue added the PAT after an illegal procedure penalty and the Longhorns were up 14-10 at the 4:30 mark of the first quarter.

That lead lasted about as long as it took to write the above paragraph as Mahomes quickly drove the Red Raiders 87 yards in eight plays to a 6-yard touchdown pass to Jonathan Giles. But Hatfield’s extra point kick was blocked, leaving Tech’s advantage at 16-14 with 1:23 to play in the first quarter.

One of the craziest plays of the college football season also featured Foreman, but ultimately garnered the Red Raiders a 23-14 lead midway through the second quarter.

Texas drove from its own 1-yard-line to the Tech 19 before Foreman took a handoff and plowed his way through the defense, carrying as many as eight players with him toward the end zone.

Just as he was making his final lunge for a touchdown, Tech defensive back Douglas Coleman reached into the pile, wrenched the ball way from Foreman and sprinted 100 yards to the opposite end zone and a reversal of fortune for the Red Raiders.

Replays were not conclusive enough to overturn the call that was made on the field, and — because the officials were still in chase mode from the far end of the field — they didn’t see Coleman step out of bounds on the 2-yard-line while being collared by Texas wide receiver Devin Duvernay.

The situation illustrated that if it wasn’t for bad breaks, the Longhorns would get no breaks at all.

Undeterred, the Longhorns pushed back down the field, moving 75 yards in nine plays to the second scoring hookup between Buechele and Johnson, this time from 9 yards away. The score cut the Tech lead to 23-21 with 3:01 to play in the first half.

Then Texas reassumed the lead, moving 48 yards in 11 plays to a Domingue 29-yard field goal and a 24-23 lead at halftime.

The Longhorns outgained Tech 390-233 in the first 30 minutes and ran 52 plays to the Red Raiders’ 37. Texas was 5-of-10 on third downs and 1-for-1 on fourth downs in the half.

Backup quarterback Tyrone Swoopes rammed home a touchdown from the 4-yard line on Texas’ opening drive of the third quarter, culminating an 11-play, 75-yard march and expanding the Longhorns’ lead to 31-23.

Mahomes and Batson hooked up for a 7-yard touchdown pass midway through the third quarter but the Red Raiders’ eschewed the chance to tie the game with a 2-point conversion and accepted a 31-30 deficit.

Foreman then roared through the middle of the line untouched for a 38-yard touchdown that allowed the Longhorns to reestablish an eight-point lead with 6:15 to play in the third quarter.

But Foreman might have saved his best for the first play of the fourth quarter. He stepped through a tackle at the line of scrimmage, lost his shoe and still outran the Tech defense for a 74-yard touchdown that swelled the Texas lead to 45-30 and put him over the 300-yard mark for the game.

“Foreman is a tremendous back,” Texas Tech coach Kliff Kingsbury said. “We knew he’d get his but the defense made some unbelievable plays to get us the ball with the chance to win the game over and over.

“Offensively, we kept floundering and not getting it done,” Kingsbury added. “All you can ask for is the ball with a chance to go win it and that’s what we had.”

 

How has Foreman become the Longhorns’ most valuable player?

Let’s get this out of the way right now — if there are Heisman Trophy voters who aren’t considering Foreman as one of the finalists, they should stand up and be counted now rather than be shouted down in ridicule later.

“You look at what D’Onta’s [accomplished] and how many yards he had,” Strong said. “It’s amazing how he continues to get better.

“D’Onta’s performance is an A-plus,” Strong said when asked to assign a grade to Foreman’s showing. “It’s as good as I’ve seen. He’s fun to watch. He works so hard.”

With his performance against Texas Tech, Foreman is the first Longhorn running back with back-to-back 200-yard games since Hodges Mitchell in 2000 and is the fourth Texas player to ever do so. It was also his 10^th straight game of at least 100 yards, allowing Foreman to creep closer to the team record of 11 consecutive outputs as established by Earl Campbell in his Heisman Trophy season in 1977.

 

What’s been the difference in the Texas defense over the past three games?

Strong took over calling the defensive signals after the Oklahoma State game, and the defense has improved in each of the contests since, leading Texas to wins in three of its past four games.

Is he really making a difference or are the right Texas players now in the correct places to make the most of their skills? That’s the question that will be answered over the final three games of the regular season.

The goal of this game was to limit Mahomes’ freelancing ability by keeping him in the pocket, staying with coverage and eventually forcing the ball out of his hand with the occasional blitz and a steady, determined pass rush.

“We wanted him to move in the pocket and once we got him to scramble, we brought one of our linebackers up to chase him to the outside,” Strong explained. “We got some good hits on him, but the key was showing [Mahomes] different looks.”

For that strategy, Texas can thank the defensive staffs of West Virginia and TCU, the two teams that played Tech before the Longhorns and developed a blueprint for stopping the West Texas Kid.

“Overall, as an offense we didn’t execute well, starting off with me,” Mahomes said. “I didn’t hit a lot of reads that I should have, and then we missed communication. Texas definitely had a great game plan but we had a lot of miscommunications throughout the game. Texas has great talent. You can’t make the mistakes we did and still win a game.”

 

What was the biggest play of the game?

Foreman’s fumble and Coleman’s ensuing 100-yard run-back for a touchdown was the play of the game — and not because of the sudden 14-point swing, but because of the way Texas responded to the situation.

“We could’ve hit a lapse there but we didn’t,” Strong said. “The offense moved the ball down the field before the fumble and there was no quit in them. They knew we were going to come back on offense and knew we were going to get a score, whether it be a field goal or a touchdown.”

The Longhorns ran off 10 points before halftime, immediately wiping away the bad taste in their collective mouths and going back to the business at hand — winning on the road.

 

Has Texas finally turned the corner?

Getting that elusive road victory, especially the way they did in Lubbock, could propel the Longhorns to greater heights.

“We control our own destiny,” Strong said. “The win last week [against then-No. 8 Baylor] helped us more than anything. We can end the season [on a good note]. We have to build on what we’ve done over these past two games.”

Texas linebacker Malik Jefferson, who led the Longhorns with eight tackles including a 22-yard sack of Mahomes, said the defense beat itself up after some flukes earlier in the season. Today, the defense has settled into a groove.

“This is us,” Jefferson said. “We want to play for each other — you could see that today. We failed and battled back. We’re all a team. I’m proud of the way we stepped up.”

 

What’s next for the Longhorns?

Texas, with only one win away from bowl eligibility with three games remaining in the regular season, returns home to face 11th-ranked West Virginia on Saturday at 11 a.m. EST. The Longhorns then travel to Kansas on Nov. 19 and host TCU the day after Thanksgiving.

“We need to build on what we did [against Tech], knowing that we have a big one at home next week,” Strong said. “We’re going to take this team and watch how it continues to grow and develop and become something special.”

[/s2If]

[s2If !current_user_can(access_s2member_level2)]

[article-offer]

[/s2If]