Texas Tech Sunday Morning Notes - We're All Ugly And Mean Edition

by Seth C on Sep 21, 2008 6:50 AM CDT in Football

Texas Tech Football:

I'm going to lead with video as KCBD 11 has video of the highlights and an interview with Ruffin McNeill (right side of the page, wait for the player to show up). For those of us starved for highlights, this is a place to start.

Up first we have a number of stories from the LAJ, including a feature on the rushing game with Leach sounding like he's embracing the rushing game:

"I’d like to know who else in the country got 300 or close to 300," Tech coach Mike Leach said. "Did somebody else get 300 yards out of the one position in the backfield? They might’ve, but I doubt it."

And Shannon Woods sounds hungry, very hungry:

"With him being hurt, he’s hungry," Woods said, "and with me going through what I went through, I’m hungry. And we don’t ever want to see anything like that happen again. I guess that’s why we’re running so hard and play like we play, because we’ve both been through it."

The defense and Ruffin McNeill sound as if they want to continue to get better:

"One thing we talk about each week is to make sure we get better as a group and individually," McNeill said. "I like the fact that they’re not worried about who we’re playing. It’s how we play. I think that’s the mentality we’ve got to make sure we keep and carry on."

And an editorial from Don Williams on how this team finally looked like it clicked against UMass (please do more of these Don):

The Tech defense might not hold Big 12 teams to single-digit games. Nor is it going to fold, however. And it looks quite capable of being a touchdown a game better than last season. That would mean giving up 17 to 20 points per, which should be good enough to win with if you are who you say are - the high-flying aerial circus.
The two most important qualities this defense has shown from game one are a penchant for game-changing plays and a determination to strictly adhere to their rest schedule. After every third down, it’s siesta time. Remember, Tech was second in the nation in third-down defense before Saturday, and by the time UMass finally converted a third down, it was a 49-7 game in the third quarter. Tech was up to the task on the first six occasions.

Finally, the LAJ's Red Raiders Football Notebook, Leach sounds pleased with the first team but not real happy with the second group.

DMN's Brandon George had final thoughts on last night's game from the College Blog, while he also featured the defense. George also pointed out that Jake Johnson got the start at left guard for Louis Vasquez and Lyle Leong got the start for Edward Britton. Interesting. I recall hearing both Johnson's name (a penalty in the first drive) and Leong's name (with an early catch).

George's game story focuses on the resurgent running game, and here's Woods, who is a quote machine:

"I tried to make the most of every opportunity," Woods said. "The [referee] didn't like us talking to the other team. I said, 'Look at us. We're all ugly and mean,' and that's what we try to do, be physical and nasty."
Snip

"That was never hidden," Woods said of Tech's ability to run. "We just never would do it. A lot of that had to do with us proving ourselves in the run game. When we perform the way we did now, you can't deny us the ball. We've done enough to get confidence from him."

The always present FWST's Dwain Price files his game story and Darcel McBath says that the defense was doing a good job of getting pressure on UMass:

"It’s never easy," said free safety Darcel McBath, who returned a third-quarter interception 45 yards for a touchdown. "We just did a great job executing.
"We put good pressure on them, so it makes it easy for us on the back end. The linebackers were doing a great job ... and we were re-routing and jamming [the receivers] up so they could barely get into their routes."

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Preseason is over

Looking ahead to our next few games, I’m feeling alot better this week than I was after the Nevada game.

It’s never 100% accurate to look at how your competition fared and extrapolate those results to how you might might play against the same teams, but nevertheless, I’ve always found it to be a useful indicator.

Missouri’s dismantling of Nevada still greatly concerns me, especially considering our struggles against Nevada’s inexperienced defence. Our defense surrendered 488 yards to Nevada, while Missouri’ defense allowed 362 yard. Fortunately, we won’t be playing Missouri until the Big 12 Championship game, and even Missouri is capable of having a bad day (see this week’s Buffalo game).

Kansas State lost badly to Louisville this week. Their three touchdowns, however, came on 50+ yard passing plays, so our defense will have to be sharp. We’ve shown a weakness against the big play in our first two games, and I hope we’ve gotten better in this respect.

Nebraska has done nothing to impress me just yet – unimpressive wins versus Western Michigan, San Jose State and New Mexico State. Let’s see how they do against Virginia Tech next week, before we’re really able to say anything (you might same the same thing about us, but I’d like to believe we’re a much better team).

Texas A&M just looks awful. I don’t think we’re looking at a ‘Norman Dale at Hoosiers turnaround scenario’ . They remind me alot more of Notre Dame and Charlie Weiss.

Finally, Kansas lost a tough one to South Florida. But this week, South Florida beat Florida International (hey, didn’t we hang 70 on those guys recently?) by a paltry 17-9. Although I am still convinced that Kansas will suffer a big drop off this season, Kansas looks more beatable to me than they did a couple of weeks ago.

If we play to our potential, I think we’ve got a legitimate shot at 8-0 heading into the Texas game, but now we’re playing against ‘real’ teams, so let’s hope a lot of the kinks have been worked out of the offense by now (I thought the earlier post on the route running problems by the inside receivers was really interesting).

Let’s also be honest, our defense remains a big question mark. Even though they’ve played well against SMU and UMass (I would characterize the perfomance against Nevada as ‘gutsy’, but that’s different than being dominating), I don’t think we know enough still.

Go Red Raiders. Stay focused!!

by LondonRaider on Sep 21, 2008 9:22 AM CDT 0 recs

just though to bring this up.....

Remember the ’05 season when the Red Raiders had finished 2nd overall in the BIG 12, only behind an unbeaten UT?? In that season Tech had only 2 losses for the season….. one to that unbeaten team and the other to the Cowboys. In that season the Red Raiders had the 32nd best Defense in the country. I remember that season greatly because of one guy that stood out more than any other…. Dewayne Slaye. Hit probably the hardest than any Corner/Safety in College Football. That was a h3!! of a Defense then wasnt it??

Then I took a look at the official results and box score of the UT/TT game played in Austin. Wow, talk about the pounding UT gave the Raiders in that game, a 52-17 trashing. I then checked out their stats and compared it to Tech’s stats…..Vince Young…. 12/22 for 239 yards, 2 TDs/2 INTs; Cody Hodges….. 42/64 for 369 yards, 2 TDs/1 INT. Total Rushing yards…. UT…. 40 for 205 yards, 5 TDs; Young had 7 for 45 with one of those TDs. TT… 29 for 99 yards and NO TDs. Total yards…. UT had 444 yards compared to Tech’s 468 yards, yet Tech lost horribly 52-17. 444 yards of offense for this UT team pounding a top 30 (at the time) Defensive team…. amazing.

Was the yardage allowed in that game in ’05 any different from what Nevada had given Tech in this game??? Not really…..Nevada had a total of 488 yards of offense to that of 421 yards of Tech. Kaepernick had completed 24 of 35 for 264 yards with a TD,1 INT and rushed for 92 yards off of 17 carries. The rushing game produced a total of 224 yards off of 47 attempts NO TDs. Harrell was only 19 of 46 for 297 yards 1 TD, 2 INTs and the Tech rushing game produced 124 yards off of 22 carries for 3 TDs. The UT team of ’05 was within the Tech 30 ATLEAST 6 times and produced TDs everytime. Nevada was within the 30 ten times and produced ONLY 4 FGs. The Tech squad of then would have more than likely of lost 52-17 or more. But this time…. that did not happen, Tech won 35-19 (could have made it 42 in the final drive).

The Defense of ‘05 finished the regular season in the top 32. That team finished only losing to OSU and UT… see where I’m going??? This team of 2008 has grown very much, that game in Reno would have been a sure loss if any previous season…. not this season. Young had a total of 239 yards in the air and 45 yards on the ground; Kaepernick had a total of 264 yards in the air and 92 yards on the ground. Kaepernick produced 25 more passing yards and produced 47 more rushing yards. Even the Nevada total rushing game produced 19 more yards than that of the ’05 UT team. The D rose to the challenge and the O produced when it was needed most (The Nevada D was all over the offense, kudos to the Wolf Pack). Everyone knows the Offense will produce, but now Tech has a Defense that they can fall on if the offense is out of sync. Wonder how this D is going to be, considering the one in ’05 was ranked 32nd overall and allowed a total of 444 yards from that Vince Young led undefeated UT team…. being in Austin and the Nevada game being in Reno. These guys have alot of heart and desire this season, right now I like what I am starting to see from this squad.
WRECK EM TECH!!!!!!

by txt3ch6uy on Sep 22, 2008 1:01 AM CDT 0 recs

I was at that game (sitting in the UT student section in red. they got over it when it was close, though), and we were able to move the ball on them all night. The key is that they would either stop us with a 3 and out or they would stop us once we moved into their territory.

That was a game where I think the running game was underutilized. They were giving us the run and henderson was playing like a madman. we could have easily relied on the run to keep the game close, but didn’t. I hope that the results of the preseason’s running game give mike the confidence to use the running game to provide some balance and a steadying hand for the air raid, and we might be able to withstand a game in which we’ve been overmatched early. (lower the number of possessions, give the defense time to collect itself, drive down the field and put some points on the board in a determined way. I know Mike wants more possessions, but if we can keep the game to 1-2 scores until late, I give us a shot to beat any team that we fall behind)

by kayakyakr on Sep 22, 2008 8:27 AM CDT up 0 recs