Longhorns Football | Five Questions Texas Tech

By Steve Habel/Associate Editor

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Reaching this point took a while and it came against an opponent known for its finesse rather than its strength.

The Texas football team finally showed its physical chops and became the presence it has strived to be since day one of the Charlie Strong era. The Longhorns beat and beat up Texas Tech 34-13 before a capacity crowd of 60,961 at windswept Jones AT&T Stadium on Nov. 1. With the victory, Texas established a template for success, both for the rest of this season and for those in the future.

Texas dominated in the trenches, especially in the second half when it[s2If current_user_can(access_s2member_level1)] outscored Texas Tech 17-0 and whipped the Red Raiders in every aspect of the game.

The Longhorns ran the ball for a season-high 241 yards — the most since rolling up 281 against Texas Tech last season. The defense was also credited with a season-best 10 pass breakups and one sack against the quick-throw Tech attack.

“It was a great team win and a real confidence builder for this team,” Strong said. “We wanted this to be a physical game because that plays to our strengths and we were able to play that way. I’m happy that we responded after the way we played last week [a 23-0 loss to Kansas State].”

Naysayers will claim that Texas (now 4-5 overall and 3-3 in Big 12 play) beat a sub-standard and undersized Tech team. They’ll say the Red Raiders had a porous defense and an offense led by a true freshman quarterback starting his first game, who later handed the offense to a walk-on signalcaller with great bloodlines but no game experience at the college level.

Those folks will look at the win and see a glass half empty.

Instead, we prefer to look at this victory as a glass half full. No matter what kind of team the Red Raiders put on the field, a win in Lubbock is never easy, and the attitude in which it was achieved was a giant leap forward for the Longhorns.

Quarterback Tyrone Swoopes went 13-for-25 for 228 passing yards without an interception and connected with wideout John Harris on a 68-yard play that was the Longhorns’ longest from the line of scrimmage this season. Harris continues to shine, hauling in five receptions for a career-high 165 receiving yards, including 123 in the first half.

And running back Malcolm Brown powered his way to 116 yards and two touchdowns on 22 carries, becoming the first Texas runner this season to gain 100 yards in a game. Co-starter Johnathan Gray added 76 yards and a touchdown on 16 totes.

“We executed on offense tonight,” offensive coordinator Shawn Watson said. “We played with real purpose and wanted to get that bad taste out of our mouths from last week. We’ve been asking a little more each week from the offense and it finally caught on tonight.”

The Longhorns scored on their first possession, driving 36 yards in seven plays to a 46-yard Nick Rose field goal and a 3-0 lead.

Later in the first quarter, Swoopes fumbled after trying to pass the ball while being sacked. Tech’s Branden Jackson picked up the loose ball in the end zone for a Red Raider touchdown. Ryan Bustin missed the PAT but Tech had a stunning 6-3 lead even though its offense was sputtering.

Rose missed a 37-yard field goal two and a half minutes into the second quarter and the momentum shifted in favor of the Red Raiders. Yet, that all changed when defensive back Quandre Diggs tattooed Tech quarterback Pat Mahomes, forcing him to fumble at the Tech 25-yard line and knocking him out of the game.

Mahomes was only starting because quarterback Davis Webb was out with an injured ankle. Mahomes’ injury forced Vincent Testaverde, Jr., son of Heisman Trophy winner Testaverde, into the fray. A non-scholarship player, Testaverde had only taken a handful of snaps with the Red Raiders’ starting offense in practice up until that point.

The Longhorns took a 10-6 lead in the second quarter as Brown scored on a 3-yard plunge, five plays after Mahomes’ fumble. The Red Raiders (now 3-6 and 1-5 in league play) responded by driving the field in nine snaps to Kenny Williams’ 6-yard touchdown run that put Tech back in front, 13-10.

Swoopes then found a streaking Harris in the open, behind three Tech defenders for his 68-yard catch and run. The pass covered 55 yards, through a 22-mile per hour breeze.

On the next play, Gray made a fierce jump cut as he got past the Tech line and cruised into the end zone for a 17-yard touchdown, giving the Longhorns a 17-13 lead at the half.

Rose added a 42-yard field goal at the 12:02 mark of the third quarter. Swoopes hit Jaxon Shipley for a 4-yard touchdown (Shipley’s first touchdown of the year) early in the fourth quarter to expand Texas’ lead to 27-13.

Brown punched one in from the 1-yard line on the Longhorns’ ensuing possession. Browns’ touchdown came at the end of a five-play, 61-yard march.

The rest of the game was garbage time.

Texas’ defense feasted on Testaverde’s inexperience, but it took a while to rattle his cage. The Longhorns held Tech to just 241 yards of passing offense and only 18 first downs, its worst output in those categories in 20 games.

 

1. Did the Texas offense really improve or was its success a byproduct of the opponent?

Since the start of the season, the Longhorns focused on becoming a downhill-running team built on the power of an offensive line that controls the ball; a team that takes occasional shots with the deep pass to keep defenses honest.

The development of the offensive line delayed the realization of that strategy, as the current lineup is completely different from the one the coaches had at the beginning of the season.

The current unit took time to gel, and it will still struggle against teams with veteran hard-nosed defenses like Kansas State. Against Tech, the Longhorn offense sputtered some early on, as the Red Raiders used blitzes to get to Swoopes and throw off timing for some of the passing plays.

But the Texas offensive line wore down the Tech defense in the second half, and the Red Raider rush was all but non-existent by midway through the third quarter. That gave Swoopes time to stand in the pocket and throw downfield. The additional time also gave Swoopes the confidence to go through his progressions to second and third options if his primary receiver was covered.

And that makes a huge difference.

We understand that Tech isn’t an elite defensive team but nothing is given in football — you have to go and take it. The Longhorns did just that.

 

2. Can one hit really change an entire game?

It certainly did against the Red Raiders. Diggs’ tackle on Mahomes not only knocked the quarterback straight into the locker room, but also lit the Longhorns’ fire. It was a high — but legal — shot and the diminutive Diggs dished out the kind of punishment that quarterbacks have to expect when they run the read-option.

“I didn’t think somebody that size can come with that much power and knock the guy down for the rest of the game,” linebacker Steve Edmond said about Diggs.

“I just ran in and hit him as hard as I could,” Diggs said. “He signed up to play football — sometimes that happens. It got us going but we should all be making those kinds of hits, those kinds of plays, every game.”

Diggs is the Longhorns’ junkyard dog and vocal conscious. The senior cornerback now has arguably made the two biggest plays of the year for the Texas defense — an interception against Baylor and the “pop that won’t stop” against Tech.

 

3. After nine games, who is the Longhorns’ most valuable player?

It’s Harris — and there’s no question about it.

If you told someone before the season started that Harris would be the leading receiver on this team, as well as the Longhorns’ No. 1 underneath option and the team’s top downfield threat, he or she would’ve called you crazy. But Harris continues to shine, even as opposing teams know that stopping him is the key to slowing the Texas offense.

“The ball goes up and Harris just finds a way to come down with it,” Strong said. “He’s so strong and physical, and he plays like that. It’s great to see him having the year he’s having.”

Harris now has 48 catches this season for 814 yards and six touchdowns. He entered the campaign with nine career catches for 190 yards and three touchdowns.

 

4. What was the biggest play of the game against Tech?

With respect to Diggs’ hit and the fumble it caused, the nod here goes to Swoopes’ 68-yard pass to Harris. The play gave the Longhorns reason to believe they could get things done with the deep ball.

Harris said he didn’t come off the line very hard because he wasn’t expecting to see the ball coming his way.

“The way we run it in practice, that ball goes to Shipley, so I was kind of in shock when he threw it [to me],” Harris said. “But he was expecting me to go make a play and those guys on defense were expecting me to make a play, so that’s what I had to do.”

The play was a real momentum changer — an aspect Harris seems to bring to the table each game.

“Once you make a big catch you have to relax and keep playing,” he said. “Anytime I get a big catch, or even if I start off with a small catch, I’m going to keep playing and waiting for that moment to make a big play.”

 

5. What’s ahead for the Longhorns?

There’s never been a better time than the present for Texas to play its best football of the season.

The Longhorns still have to win two of their final three games to be bowl eligible. The final stretch of the campaign starts Nov. 8 when West Virginia comes calling to Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium.

The Longhorns certainly won’t be overconfident in their preparation for the Mountaineers. West Virginia (6-3 overall and 4-2 in Big 12 play) lost to TCU 31-30 Saturday and will be mighty irked about it.

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