Texas Tech football: 5 worst moments of 2020 season

No. 2: The bugled onside kick vs. OK State

Speaking of the kicking game and bad decisions, Wells’ choice to try an onside kick while his team was actually leading Oklahoma State in Stillwater would prove to be one of the worst moments of this season.  Of course, that’s because the Cowboys would return that kick for a TD to completely turn the momentum of the game in their favor.

What made that call all the more head-scratching was the fact that at that point in the game, Tech had come up with five-consecutive stops of the OSU offense.  Thus, an onside kick was far from necessary.

This was an awful moment in the course of the season.  That’s because it was an unnecessary act of desperation the result of which further cemented the opinion within the majority of the fandom that Wells is not the right man for this job.

But let’s imagine for a moment that he would have played it straight in that moment and just kicked the ball deep and trusted his defense.  Perhaps his defense would have come up with yet another stop and that would have had a huge impact on a game that OSU would win by just six points.

Instead, this turn of events seemed to knock Wells’ team for a loop.  On four of the next five possessions, Tech would throw a pick-six, lose a fumble, turn the ball over on downs, and give up a safety.

Thus, this doomed onside kick was by far one of the worst moments of the year.  In fact, it likely prevented Tech from pulling an upset and it kept the team from eventually getting to five wins, which would have been an important step forward for this struggling program.