We’re one week out from the Houston Cougars hosting Joey McGuire and the Texas Tech Red Raiders. One week out. And Friday evening, the Houston Cougars really had some problems with the Oregon State Beavers.
There’s a few potential reasons for those struggles.
One could be that Houston was looking ahead to the upcoming matchup with Texas Tech and almost got caught in a trap game against Oregon State. With the way the Red Raiders look, it seems plausible that plenty of teams will be circling their calendar for the day of their matchup with Texas Tech as a point of focus.
Another could be that Houston was just simply exhausted and happened to be completely out of a rhythm by having to play a game that kicked off at 9:30 Central Time on a Friday. That is not the norm for anyone operating in the state of Texas and there’s no way that didn’t have some sort of impact on Houston’s readiness to play.
The Houston Cougars had some major problems with Oregon State one week ahead of a home matchup with Texas Tech
Maybe it was both of those reasons! Or maybe Oregon State was simply tired of being winless. Maybe it was a matchup thing and the Beavers just happened to be the right sort of team to provide a challenge for Houston.
Any number of things could be happening there.
Regardless of what caused the issues, the issues were definitely real for Houston. The Coogs were outgained on offense and were also held to under 400 yards of total offense by Oregon State’s porous defense. UH converted on just 6-of-15 third downs. There were some very real issues on offense.
Then there’s the fact that Oregon State was able to score 24 points in this game. This is a team that, at 0-5, has only managed to score 20 or more points on two occasions: against Fresno State and then against Houston.
That’s not great for either of those teams. Cal held Oregon State to 15. Texas Tech allowed the Beavers to score 14. Oregon kept them to a touchdown. Fresno State gave up 27. Houston gave up 24.
And now Texas Tech gets to travel to Space City to meet up with the team that just struggled with Oregon State. Admittedly, that feels pretty good.