No. 13 Texas Tech takes advantage of turnovers to beat K-State 43-20, ending 8-game series skid

“That was a huge win,” said Texas Tech coach Joey McGuire, who arrived for his postgame news conference wearing a T-shirt with a photo of former Kansas State linebacker-turned-Red Raiders athletic director Kirby Hocutt across the front of it.

“This is no disrespect to K-State,” McGuire said. “It's a tip of my hat to my AD who played linebacker here, and it's been a long time since we beat Kansas State. ... I know it was a big win for him and a huge win for this team.”

Texas Tech is off to its best start in conference play since that year, when Mike Leach guided the team to the Cotton Bowl.

“Winning the turnover battle is a huge thing for us," said Texas Tech linebacker Jacob Rodriguez, the preseason Big 12 defensive player of the year, who forced two of the fumbles. "And we knew we had to do that to win.”

Avery Johnson threw for 199 yards and a touchdown while running for 86 and two more scores. But Kansas State's quarterback also threw two interceptions and was responsible for a late fumble that Texas Tech returned for a touchdown.

Along with the slew of turnovers, the Wildcats also were 0 for 4 on fourth down.

“I thought our guys battled on defense,” Kansas State coach Chris Klieman said. "We just didn’t have enough.”

Morton, who had been out of the lineup with a leg injury, opened the game with an interception of his own. But Johnson threw a pick right back, and it was the beginning of a messy first half in which both failed on fourth down, Kansas State lost a fumble and Texas Tech nearly did the same.

The Red Raiders eventually made Kansas State pay for its mistakes, though.

They turned a fumble by Jayce Brown into a touchdown to take a 9-7 lead. They turned a three-and-out late in the first half into a 55-yard field goal. And they turned another fumble, this time from Garrett Oakley on the fourth play of the second half, into a 41-yard run by Williams that silenced the crowd and gave Texas Tech a 19-7 lead.

“Some things happened that absolutely can’t happen when you play a team like that,” Klieman said.

Johnson tried to answer with his second TD run for Kansas State, but Texas Tech's offense kept on going. Stone Harrington drilled another field goal and Caleb Douglas hauled in a short touchdown throw to make it 29-14 heading into the fourth quarter.

Texas Tech's defense took care of the rest.

After the Wildcats scored with 12:44 to go, the Red Raiders stopped the 2-point try to keep it a two-score game. Later in the quarter, they stuffed Johnson for a loss on fourth down near midfield. And when the Texas Tech offense fumbled the ball right back, the Red Raiders again stopped the Wildcats on fourth down with less than 6 minutes to go.

Texas Tech linebacker John Curry returned Johnson's fumble for a touchdown with 4:52 left to put the game away.

“I’m really, really proud of the way we handled adversity today," Morton said. “We got down and we fought back.”

The takeaway

Texas Tech hardly played a clean game — the turnovers hurt, as did some penalties. But with Morton back under center, the Red Raiders were able to overcome them against a team that was coming off an emotional win over rival Kansas.

Kansas State simply made too many mistakes, and not just the turnovers and penalties. Brown and Oakley dropped passes at key points in the game, the latter when the Wildcats turned it over on downs late in the fourth quarter.

Up next

Texas Tech returns home to play No. 10 BYU next Saturday.

Kansas State is off before visiting Oklahoma State on Nov. 15.

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