First things first on a significant college football Saturday: The main reason the TCU Horned Frogs lost their first game of 2015 is that the Oklahoma State Cowboys played brilliantly.
The Cowboys played this game the way they wanted to on both sides of the ball. They produced more home-run plays on offense and forced TCU to move the ball in more snaps and smaller gains. They took a big lead, protected it well, and left no doubt as to which team was better.
TCU didn’t lose primarily because of TCU; the Frogs lost because of their opponent. Mason Rudolph, James Washington, and the Cowboys’ back seven all played with sharpness, clarity and energy. They were ready for their big-stage moment, and they played like it.
With that having been said, however, Saturday was very much a day on which TCU got exposed. This doesn’t mean the Frogs are fraudulent (the idea that a one-loss team in November is fraudulent is an extreme statement, to say the least), but it does mean their weaknesses were glaring enough to create a decisive loss.
*
Trevone Boykin’s shoulders were sore heading into Saturday — not literally, but metaphorically.
Boykin carried TCU on those shoulders, scoring 40 or more points with great consistency, often knowing that he’d need to post huge numbers just to win games. TCU twice allowed 45 points or more this season, at Texas Tech and Kansas State. Whereas Texas Tech lost two games when scoring 52 or more this season, TCU won two games when allowing 45 or more. Boykin made that happen, and so as this game approached, the Horned Frogs — for all they wanted to achieve on defense — had to inwardly know that with all the attrition they’ve gone through on that side of the ball, Boykin and the offense had to be virtually perfect in order for the dream season to live on.
When a team inhabits that kind of situation on the road, it’s asking for trouble. The Frogs and head coach Gary Patterson surely wondered, in the backs of their minds: “What if we fall behind by a lot of points again, as we did at Kansas State? What if we don’t start well this time? Are we going to be able to pull a rabbit out of the hat again?”
It was the scenario TCU had to avoid, a scenario Patterson’s injury-riddled defense needed to prevent.
It didn’t happen.
Rudolph and Washington took their lethal pitch-and-catch relationship to a new level on Saturday, torching TCU’s hapless secondary for one mammoth play after another. Any possession in which TCU didn’t get six points felt like a turnover, and so as soon as the Cowboys forged a 28-9 lead in the second quarter, TCU fell into that low-percentage ditch once again.
Boykin, trying to do the improbable, pressed. Thrust into another difficult situation — but this time, against a team with a more balanced offense and a more rugged defense than either Texas Tech or Kansas State — the Heisman Trophy candidate felt the weight of the moment. Oklahoma State defensive coordinator Glenn Spencer was happy to give Boykin short passes while continuing to disguise coverages in specific preparation for this matchup. In long-yardage situations and on third downs beyond a few yards, the Cowboys pounced.
TCU’s blueprint for victory was very specific and very limited. As soon as the Frogs stumbled out of the gate with a combination of dropped passes, defensive breakdowns, and penalties, the framework for this Oklahoma State runaway had been established.
TCU isn’t an inherently fragile team, but the Frogs were asking for a beatdown if they didn’t start this road game authoritatively. Fortunate on “The Flea Tipper” at Texas Tech and resourceful in their 18-point comeback at Kansas State, the Frogs might have needed to score 50 points to win once again, but they needed to score those 50 points within the context of a relatively even game. Scoring 50 in eternal catch-up mode is something a team cannot do multiple times during a season.
In November, a college football team’s flaws come home to roost if not fixed in the first quarter.
*
A lot more will be said about an Oklahoma State team which — it can be claimed — is now the Big 12 favorite. In the coming days and weeks, you’ll read a lot about a collection of Cowboys which gets Baylor and Oklahoma at home, owning the inside track to a league championship.
On this day, though, we have to note the fall of TCU, a team whose house of cards needed to be fortified during a week of practice. When the Horned Frogs faltered in the opening minutes on Saturday, the stage was set for a nasty fall from grace — for a team, its diminished Heisman candidate, and a coaching staff which couldn’t solve longstanding issues on defense.