The Red Raiders went into Waco and beat Baylor 39-14, the first win of 2023 on the road and only the second road win under head coach Joey McGuire, getting Texas Tech to 3-3 and 2-1 in Big 12 conference play.
“Great road win, that’s one thing that we’ve talked about,” McGuire said. “We got some guys back, Dooda Banks and Jesiah Pierre played exceptionally well tonight. We just found a way to not just win the game but pull away and win a big conference game on the road.”
The Tech defense put on a show, generating six sacks and 11 tackles for loss, including the first sacks of the season for Syracuse transfer Steve Linton.
“With Linton, all the credit goes to Mike Ramirez and our training staff, earlier in the week, we weren’t sure Steve was going to play, he’s got an ankle,” McGuire said. “We felt like we had an advantage there in the pass rush. It showed up, two sacks and I think he knocked the ball out twice.”
Baylor was only able to generate 17 net rushing yards on Saturday, the best showing for the Red Raiders all season, especially impressive for a defense that was top-20 in EPA/Rush against heading into the game.
“Last year, we played their wide zone really well and the B-run was the pin-and-pull,” McGuire said. “They had a little success with the pin-and-pull tonight but we worked the heck out of that this week. The key to that is playing well on the backside of the play, Myles Cole has some big tackles on that too.”
McGuire and the Red Raiders leaned on Tahj Brooks, the running back who is absolutely rolling at this point in the season, having accumulated four-games in a row with 100 or more rushing yards.
“Tahj had a 24-yard run, which was the long, but again 5.5 yards per carry, I’m going to take that every time,” McGuire said. “I think the fumble really affected him, he was really pressing in the second half. He’s just a workhorse right now.”
Despite the Red Raiders missing their starting left guard in Cole Spencer, who McGuire said is “week-to-week” and “dealing with a foot,” the Tech offensive line was able to keep Behren Morton clean, only allowing one sack and creating great holes in the run game.
“Offensive line wise, they did some stuff to take away our counter game,” McGuire said. “Jacoby Jackson was really pressing but we came back in halftime, really settled him down, went back to what we were doing and I thought the O-Line played great.”
The return game for a ton of coaches on the staff, including the head coach, ending in a win to silence a ton of the road woes for Tech. McGuire echoed that there were emotions, but it boils down to a massive conference win.
“Yea, a lot of emotions,” McGuire said. “It’s emotional. I was here for five years, I was a part of ’19, winning the conference championship. A little bit more removed, if it was last year at Baylor it would’ve been a little more emotional just because of the number of guys that were on the team. At the end of the day, it’s all about the conference win.”
Texas Tech looks to continue the momentum on Saturday against Kansas State back in Lubbock at 6 p.m.
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