Summary

Wow, I’m almost speechless.  But, you know me, I’ve always got something to say.  So, we’re soft, huh?  I take this time to apologize to the most gracious fans of Kansas, but I have to get this off my chest.  Holy, mother of the little 6 lb, 8 oz, Baby Jesus was that an ass whipping from hell or what? 

I have one more thought I would like to add.  This reminds me of high school, when you beat someone by 30 in football that you know will hand your basketball team a 50 point loss in the offseason.  Kind of like Southlake Carroll and Duncanville.  Except it’s a bigger deal in the Panhandle because we weren’t scared of getting shivved in Shamrock, TX.  So, now you’ve earned the right to travel to road basketball games and wear your letter jacket with your football number and district champs patch on it and flirt with all their Bible Belt virgins.  While, the women on their football team prove that they can beat the women on our football team in a sport where you are penalized for contact.  Unless of course, you’re from Gruver, the Kansas Jayhawks of the Panhandle.

My Baby Jesus is watching the Raiders up 63-14 over Kansas in the 4th.

Interesting first quarter that finished knotted at 14.  McNeill shows he has done his filmwork and has Bront Bird ready to drop a WR hitch screen for an 8 yard loss.  We run 2 plays of Cover 2 man under, limit the damage on the ground, and then Brandon Williams and McKinner Dixon force Reesing to throw the ball away on 3rd down.  KU punts and we go up 7-0 Tech, now that we’ve correctly identified how to use the talents of Edward Britton.  We come back on defense featuring backup personnel and mostly Cover 2 zone.  KU promptly marches down the field and caps the drive by catching Darcel McBath on playaction for a TD, 7-7.  It would be one of the only flaws in McBath’s game this day.  Tech answers on a drive featuring 2 Baron Batch touches for 52 yards.  Harrell and Crabtree finish it off with an All American throw and catch, 14-7 Tech. 

I’m thinking surely we learned our lesson on the last drive, but nope, we need one more filling of backups and cover 2 zone in 4-3 base to make sure.  KU drives down the field and knots it at 14-14.  Batch takes another screen for 24 to the KU 6 yard line and Harrell connects with Morris to put Tech up 21-14. 

At this point in the game, Todd Reesing was 9 of 10 for 98 yards and 2 TDs.  McNeill has had enough and rolls out with his nickel package playing man under and cover 1.  Nickerson breaks up a curl route on 1st down.  Brandon Williams pressures Reesing on a bootleg and Duncan drops an interception on 2nd down playing man under cover 2.  Dixon notches his 7th sack of the season (he had 6 coming into the game, not the 5 I quoted last week) out of the dime (or “jet”) package and the game is effectively over.  Tech finishes off a 49-0 run before Kansas can finally get on the board with 3:52 left in the game. 

McNeill would call four straight drives of predominantly man coverage before settling back into cover 2 zone  for a couple of drives and letting McBath pad his interception total for the year.  After the 1st quarter, Reesing would finish the game 7 of 16 for 56 yards and 3 interceptions.  In addition to Dixon’s drive ending sack, Brandon Williams would answer the call himself with a stripped ball on Reesing along the way.  The overmatched KU freshman tackles had no answer for the pair of All Conference caliber players.  McBath took over the game in the secondary with his physical play and made Reesing pay for every bad throw he made.  3 times.  In a row.  I had to touch myself to make sure this was really happening when Taylor Potts was tossing around NFL darts to put Tech up 63-14 with 11 minutes left in the 4th.  I was actually furious at one point seeing extremely valuable starters like Harrell, Winn, Lewis, Dixon, B. Williams, Whitlock, Duncan and McBath still on the field.  These are the guys we’re going to need healthy to have a chance to beat the Texas Longhorns next week.  Anyway, other than my concerns about defending the option next week, which I’ll address in more detail later, this was the best road game against a quality opponent in the history of Texas Tech football.  We always choke in these games, when the spotlight is shining, and yeah, maybe Kansas is a little overrated.  But, that’s not what folks were saying last week when they played OU on the road and rolled up 491 yards of total offense.  That’s about as close to a shutdown performance of a good spread offense as you can get.  Ruffin McNeill, you earned my respect on this day, and called a brilliant game.  You seem to have gained confidence in your players and they’ve responded with a resounding affirmative. 

Offense

Leach’s record improves to 29-3 since 2005 when the RB position exceeds 20 touches in a game.  Batch and Woods combined for 24 touches and 196 total yards, with Woods adding 2 TDs on the ground.  They quietly kept the chains moving and Batch’s two big screen plays early broke the game open for the offense.  Leach had the KU defensive staff off balance all day and it didn’t really make a shit what he ran as it all worked.  He’s also becoming very comfortable in knowing how to use specialized personnel like Ed Britton and Lyle Leong.  Leach couldn’t have drawn up a better gameplan and the players executed from start to finish.

Quarterback

I’m going to give Graham Harrell his first offensive MVP award of the season from me.  Wow, did he answer the call.  It always seems like we’re in Reesing’s shoes after these games, but you’ve seen Harrell reach a new level of maturity with his decision making.  He’s not locking onto Crabtree, he’s spreading the ball around, and he’s not forcing passes.  Harrell even ran for first downs against flooded coverage.  Most of all, he protected the football and finished 34-42 for 386 yards, 5 TDs passing and added 1 more on the ground.  As flawless as I’ve ever seen him play and that makes me feel better about facing the Longhorns this week.

Running Back

Baron Batch went into the locker room with 7 touches for 107 yards.  Since he’s been battling turf toe, Shannon Woods carried the load in the 2nd half and played good as well finishing with 14 carries for 79 yards and 2 short TDs.  Woods ran determined, breaking more tackles than his usual self.  I think Batch is excellent motivation for him.  Both guys did their job, and I was really proud to see Woods running as hard as he was.

Wide Receivers

Detron Lewis has developed into Harrell’s go-to guy on 3rd down, and that’s two games in a row where Lewis has caught everything thrown his direction and made positive things happen after the catch.  Dude only had 5 catches for 43 yards, but 2 were on 3rd downs during the critical drive to put this game away at 28-14.  Where do we keep getting these guys and why do our “projects” never turn out as busts?  Tramain Swindall, Jacoby Franks, Adam James at TE, Lyle Leong.  Why do guys like these always seem to pan out for Tech?  Maybe they’re pretty good football players.  Eric Morris was money near the goalline and as a safety valve.  We’ve finally figured out how to appropriately use the services of Edward Britton.  You don’t throw a really fast guy with sketchy hands a bunch of slants and curls where he has to come back to the football.  Run playaction between the 20s, let him get behind the safeties, and catch the ball over his shoulder going the same direction as the ball.  Do this and his statline will look like the following:  3 catches for 106 yards and 1 TD.  Then, put in your state champion high jumper with glue hands in the red zone.  Well played, Coach Leach and Coach Riley.  Michael Crabtree reminded us all that he’s indeed still a warlock on a 16 yard slip screen and a couple of fabulous grabs where he just seemed to pluck the ball out of the air.  I can’t remember any drops and that’s two games in a row where this unit has looked sharp and everyone has contributed.  Good timing with a deep, talented, but very young secondary coming to town. 

Offensive Line

Their domination of opponents each week is becoming routine.  Run or pass.  There are a few little things I could harp on, but overall, everyone of them played a good game, and Brandon Carter has bounced back nicely the last two games after the molestation he received by Nebraska’s Suh.  This team is strong on the tackles, and solid, not good, in the middle.  Vasquez, Hamby and Carter will need to bring their A game this week and communicate well as they’ve got a mountain of a task ahead of them in Roy Miller and Lamarr Houston.  Miller plays in the NG mostly and will be drawing the Hamby/Vasquez double team, which should be sufficient to at least neutralize him.  Our success on offense this week will largely depend on the one-on-one success of Brandon Carter against Lamarr Houston.  Carter has struggled with strong, quick guys in the past (Ziggy Hood/Suh) and he’ll be on his own in this contest.  Godspeed, Mr. Carter, as Houston is a hell of a player.

Defense

There’s not a damn thing I can really complain about except for our option defense, which I’ll get into later.  McNeill adjusted his coverages and leveraged that into sacks and turnovers.  Kansas put up better numbers running than I expected, most of the damage came in the afforementioned option game and a few instances of formational mismatches.  All of it was irrelevant to the outcome of the game, and it seemed when we really wanted to stop the run, we could.  I’ve hinted that what makes this unit special is the ability to get pressure on the QB without blitzing.  McNeill is starting to use that more to his advantage as we’ve played almost 4 quarters of significant man coverage in our last 6.  In those 4 quarters, we’ve outscored our opponents 65-2 getting damn near 2 sacks per quarter.  That’s enough punts for Tech to win football games.

Defensive Tackles

Whitlock and Jones were solid again, and I’m not so sure Richard Jones isn’t an upgrade to Rajon Henley against the run.  Dude is active and disruptive on most plays.  Sesay was a little better this game, and the freshman Chris Perry saw his most significant time of the season.  Perry shows some signs of potential as a space-eating, run stuffer, but I don’t think he’s quick enough to generate the inside pass rush that Whitlock and Henley do when healthy.  For now, he needs to learn to play with his pad level lower.

Defensive Ends

That’s several games in a row now that Brandon Williams and McKinner Dixon have played an All Conference level of football.  Williams will earn a spot with Brian Orakpo on the first team, and in most years, Dixon would join him, but he’ll have to settle for 2nd team this year.  Maybe next, when Orakpo graduates.  It’s been an enjoyment this season watching Brandon Williams develop from a raw athlete, who just ran around last year, into a well-disciplined, machine of fucking death.  Both guys are playing the run exceptional this year and upheld their end of the bargain on option plays.  Real quick, when was the last time you remember a QB continually pulling the ball out on a zone read play and running around the end for 25 yards?  Nevada maybe?  They’re doing a good job of staying at home and forcing the give to the RB, and that’s a good thing with Colt McCoy on the schedule next.  Both defended the naked bootlegs and half rollouts well.  Dixon got credit for a sack, fumble recovery and at least one other hurry.  Williams got his 8th sack of the season, stripped Reesing of the ball on a speed rush, forced 3 or 4 hurried throws and arguably could be responsible for one of the interceptions and two should have been interceptions by Duncan and Marlon Williams.  I thought he might be a difference maker in this game facing the freshman tackle Hatch, and he exceeded my expectations.   It didn’t look like Dixon was hurt too bad and I expect him to be ready to go next week.  We’ll need him as these two guys are the reason we can play with the Longhorns.

Linebackers

Duncan had a rough go at it in the 1st half, which didn’t find him at the MLB position for too many plays.  However, when settled back in during the 2nd half playing behind Whitlock and Jones, Duncan returned to his typical high level of play.  Bront Bird and Marlon Williams both had some good and bad.  For Bird, the good consisted of the first play from scrimmage, man coverage efforts, and 3 goalline plays between the tackles on KU’s last TD.  For Marlon, it consisted of some steady bend-but-don’t break tackling 8 yards down the field on 3rd and 15, which is what we need Marlon to do.  The bad was pretty similar to what we saw Nebraska do in that these two guys have one other vice besides shitty, homemade rap music and bad mullets, which is susceptibility to the crack block.  We’ve finally got our DEs smashing in the face of the opposing QB.  Now, we need to get our OLBs off the ground to tackle the pitch man.  Look for a lot of this from Texas as McCoy is perfectly capable of running the option, Cosby is a devastating blocker, the play exists in the page of Greg Davis’ playbook, and we’ve been sucking darrell royally at defending it.  Only the outstanding open field tackling of McBath and Charbonnet have been saving us to date and keeping this within the 10 yard range.  And I expect that’s who we’ll walk up on the slot receivers, if they’re killing us with it.  We will then be the subject of some brutal playaction activity.  Let’s hope Williams and Dixon can get there before it matters.

Say brother, did I tell ya about that time we wuz playin’ Midland Lee?

Cornerbacks

Once again, I think they’re solid to decent man cover guys, and pretty shitty at zone.  It usually plays out that way and this game was no exception.

Safeties

I’ve been a critic of Darcel McBath in the past for not making enough plays.  After the 3rd interception in a row, I said, “Okay, okay, enough Darcel, you’ve made me forget about you getting burned on that first TD and convinced me that with your level of game the last two weeks, that you indeed are a maker of plays.”  We played in our nickel package a lot more in this game than in the past, and we used a strategy I hadn’t thought of.  McNeill walked McBath up in man over the slot, brought Hines in to play deep safety, and had Charbonnet on the other slot in man.  We then overloaded the run and had tremendous success in defending both options.  Amazing how that shit works and we may have stumbled into our best option for Dez Bryant along the way.  McBath received a well-earned defensive MVP award for his 3 picks, good coverage, and solid tackling.  I’ll forgive him of the TD with that many plays.  Outstanding game.  Charbonnet was solid and proves to be perfectly capable of routine plays, which is all we need with McBath playing like Michael Jackson filming a Pepsi commercial.

Darcel McBath has been playing with his hair on fire of late.

Conclusion

I think Leach and this team wanted to send a message this week.  They were underdogs on the road, had played some real good quarters of football, mixed with some bad, and were determined to play a 4 quarter football game.  The 42-0 domination of the 2nd and 3rd quarters proved to be sufficient.  Outstanding game to Coach Leach, Coach McNeill and these players.  You are certainly relevant, and if I dare say, dangerous.

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