A new look at TCU, but the same Gary Patterson in charge
They just scored 82 points — eighty-flippin-two! — despite one lousy effort.
That was Gary Patterson last week, the coach who is never happy, never satisfied, never ever done, reminding his TCU team that this thing, this carnival ride no one expected and can’t turn away from, could derail at any minute.
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A mistake here, a missed tackle there; a loss of concentration or a lack of vision and the next thing you know, some guy is running on the field to nail a short, game-winning field goal that feels like a kick in the gut.
Even when you’re winning by 55.
“He sat everyone down in the locker room and told us to stay focused,” said TCU quarterback Trevone Boykin. “Because we haven’t played anyone like the team we’re going to play next.”
It doesn’t matter who 6-1 TCU plays next — even if it is white-hot West Virginia. The man who built this program isn’t going to change. He’s obsessive and he’s compulsive and every single move he makes is painstakingly calculated.
Gary Patterson doesn’t do fads, doesn’t fall for the latest hiccup in the course of every breath matters. Longtime legendary TCU defensive coordinator Dick Bumpas told me he’d never seen a man who has to — wait, must — know every detail about every football move.
And how it affects every other move, too.
Now that you understand the who and what of Patterson, get this: At the end of last year, after an ugly, first-of-its-kind eight-loss season, Patterson scrapped everything about his pro-style, conservative offense, hired two Mike Leach disciples to run the show and let it rip.
Patterson doesn’t let anything rip, yet he was so serious about giving complete control of his offense to new co-coordinators Doug Meacham and Sonny Cumbie, he even relented on the thing he cherishes most: practice.
“He told me, I know you guys have to practice a certain way, and I’m willing to change practice to make that happen,” Cumbie said. “I knew then he was serious.”
Now, look: The pass-happy Horned Frogs — it sounds funny even saying it — are the darlings of the first College Football Playoff poll. Even a late loss a Baylor (a kick-in-the-gut loss, no less) hasn’t pushed this team from the front burner.
It’s not just TCU’s victories over ranked teams Oklahoma and Oklahoma State, it’s the way the No. 7 Horned Frogs are making it happen — and how it has them on target to reach the CFP semifinals.
TCU has the nation’s most-improved offense in both total yards (plus-228.2 yards per game) and points (plus-25.3 points per game), and leads the nation in scoring offense (50.4 ppg) and is No.2 in total offense (573 ypg).
Seven games into this season, TCU already has scored 52 more points than all of last season — and still leads the Big 12 in six defensive categories. The Frogs also have Boykin, who earlier in his career was moved to wideout because he wasn’t going to play quarterback — only to win the job in August over graduate transfer Matt Joekel (remember that big deal?) and eventually put on such a show over the first half of the season that he’s now a legitimate Heisman Trophy candidate.
“Sometimes when you look at it, I guess it’s a little crazy,” Boykin said.
You want crazy? This time last year, Boykin caught 11 passes against West Virginia. Now he’s the key to the offense, a player who is so good in the Meacham-Cumbie system, he’s one of three quarterbacks since 2009 to average more than 300 yards passing and 50 yards rushing per game.
The other two: Robert Griffin III and Johnny Manziel — and they both won the Heisman.
He’s a last-second field goal loss to Baylor (see: kick in the gut) from leading an unbeaten TCU team that, more than likely, would be the No.1 team in the nation right now. If TCU hadn’t blown a 21-point lead in the fourth quarter, it would have two wins over top five teams and another over a top 20 team.
And that’s why a 55-point win over Texas Tech last week may as well have been by one single point. There’s no margin for error in Patterson’s world, no thought process that allows anyone associated with TCU to think anything different than next week, next team up, is all out hell.
“Bad things happen when you’re complacent,” Patterson said.
Good things happen when you’re not — and then let it rip.
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