Texas Tech football: How Red Raiders can survive until Alan Bowman returns

Show us the vaunted gunning game that we were supposed to see

Since the moment he first put on the Double-T, Matt Wells has been proclaiming the importance of running the football.  With Bowman out, that aspect of the game will be even more critical for the offense.

"“We’re going to run the football when we want to run it,” Wells said when he was introdcuted to the fans back in December.  “We’ll be a physical running team. You cannot win games in the month of November in this league if you don’t run the football in November, okay? I promise you that.”"

Now it’s time for his team to prove those sentiments to be true.  However, what we’ve seen thus far from Tech on the ground has looked less than over-powering.

Right now, Tech ranks just No. 7 in the Big 12 and No. 74 in the country in rushing offense.  The good news is that this year’s team is running for 35 yards per game more this year (167.3) than last year.

But in the season’s first real test, Tech’s ground game was disappointing.  Against Arizona, the Red Raiders amassed just 104 yards.

However, as we noted earlier this week, it seemed like the yards were there to be had.  On the only two successful drives of the night, Tech ran the ball on 53.8% of its plays but on all other drives, the Red Raiders ran the ball only 26.8% of the time.

Thus far, Yost had relied far more heavily on Bowman’s right arm than on his ground game.  He’s had Bowman throw the ball 154 times while calling 95 rushing plays.  That’s surprising given that last year at Utah State, he ran the ball slightly more than he threw it.

Expect the Red Raiders to be much more inclined to keep the ball on the ground with Bowman out.  And if backup Jeff Duffey, who led the team in rushing last year, can bring another explosive element to that part of the offense, there could be enough offense in Lubbock to survive until Bowman returns.