Texas Tech football: Hidden moments from 37-34 win over Texas

A UT penalty bails Tech out of a bad situation

On Tech’s second possession, things got out of hand just after the home team crossed midfield.  A holding penalty on second down and a blown-up screen pass that lost three yards on third down left Donovan Smith and the offense facing a 3rd-and-26 from their own 44.

The likelihood of a conversion in such a scenario is minuscule at best.  However, that’s what the Red Raiders got thanks to a pair of UT penalties.

First, the Longhorns jumped offsides before the snap giving Smith a free play.  Making the smart decision, the Tech QB then took a shot downfield for Neimiah Martinez, who drew a pass interference flag on Texas defensive back Jaylon Guilbeau.

That infraction on Gilbeau would give the Red Raiders a fresh set of downs to work with.  And it was all because he didn’t turn to look back for the ball.

However, one factor working against Gilbeau was that the ball was slightly underthrown forcing Martinez, who had a step on Gilbeau, to slow down.  Once that happened, Gilbeau ran through Martinez and essentially tackled him, making the call obvious to the officials.

For the game, there were only ten total penalties enforced, five on each team.  Tech would give up 31 yards on penalties while Texas would give up ten more.

Thus, flags didn’t play as much of a role in this game as they have in previous games between these two programs.  But this infraction would prove to be huge as five plays later, Smith would complete a TD pass to Tahj Brooks out of the backfield to give the Red Raiders a 14-10 lead.