Texas Tech Football Must Solve Kicking Woes This Spring

One of the most important areas for the Texas Tech football team to address this spring is the kicking game, which cost the Red Raiders dearly last season.

College football fans typically don’t spend much time discussing the place-kicking competition around the office water cooler or at the local diner. But Texas Tech fans that saw kicking woes cost their team at least two victories last season, are keeping an keen eye on this crucial aspect of the game as spring practices unfold.

Arguably, no position group on the team performed worse last season that the place-kickers. As a team, Tech converted a woeful 52% of its attempts last year, ranking 122nd out of 130 teams in the nation. That was a shocking drop from 2016 when the Red Raiders hit 91.6% of its attempts.

The main reason for the collapse was a hip injury suffered by preseason all-Big 12 kicker Clayton Hatfield. The Boerne, Texas native missed over half of his junior season appearing in just six games and when he returned, he still was not 100% healthy.

"“I’d get better. I’d come back,” he told LubbockOnline.com. “I felt a hundred percent. I’d start kicking again and after about a week, it’d creep back up. So it was kind of touchy because I wouldn’t know until I started kicking again.”"

After having a 90% success rate in his first two collegiate seasons, Hatfield connected on just 60% (6-10) of his kicks last season. And some of the misses were painful to watch.

The problem was that Hatfield, in his injured state was Texas Tach’s best option. Junior Michael Barden was just 4-8 on field goals and true freshman Michael Ewton was only 1-3.

In other words, Texas Tech desperately needs Hatfield to return to form. Fortunately, there are encouraging signs thus far in spring practice.

LubbockOnline.com reports that Hatfield made 20-21 attempts through the first six team workouts and he was true on a 40-yard attempt at the Midland scrimmage.

Clayton Hatfield boots a 40-yard FG during th Texas Tech football scrimmage. #MRTsports pic.twitter.com/HnMrnFSE1g
— Christopher Hadorn (@chris_MRTsports) March 24, 2018

Texas Tech simply can’t afford another field goal kicking disaster in 2018 when the team will be fielding an offense featuring a new quarterback and three new starting receivers. It might be unfair to expect the 2018 offense to be as dominant as we’ve come to expect in years past, especially early, so converting on field goal chances will be huge.

More from Wreck'Em Red

Last season, Texas Tech saw its place-kicking woes cost the team at least two Big 12 wins. The Red Raiders missed three field goals in a nine-point loss at West Virginia, a game in which the Red Raiders held a 35-17 second half lead.

Then, a 31-yard Hatfield miss with just 3:40 to play prevented Tech from taking an virtually insurmountable 11-point lead against Kansas State. On the ensuing drive, the Wildcats scored a touchdown and converted a two-point attempt to send the game to overtime where they would prevail.

Had Texas Tech been able to count on a healthy Hatfield last season, Tech would have had an 8-win season and the narrative surrounding the program this offseason would be far different.

Now, it is on Kingsbury and new special teams coordinator Adam Scheier to solidify the kicking game. Scheier has been coaching special teams for 18 seasons and has had stops at Wake Forrest, Bowling Green, Lehigh and Princeton.

Next: Top 5 Texas Tech Basketball Games of 2017-18

Scheier has built his reputation on producing excellent punters so it remains to be seen how much he can help Hatfield and the other place-kickers. Perhaps, the most vital member of the staff for the place-kickers is going to be head athletic trainer Andrew Krueger who can help keep Hatfield healthy and kicking straight. If that happens, there’s reason to believe the kicking nightmares of last year will not resurface again.

Home/Texas Tech Football