Handing out game balls for the Texas Tech football team's win at Arizona

What a difference a month makes for the Texas Tech football team. Following the September 7th loss at Washington State 37-16, the Red Raiders were reeling after looking terrible in their first two games of the season.

At that point, there were few people who thought Texas Tech would be atop the Big 12 standings at 3-0 just a month later. However, following this weekend's 28-22 win at Arizona, that's where head coach Joey McGuire has his team.

In the preseason, most expected the Red Raiders to take care of Arizona State and Cincinnati at home to open conference play. However, the road trip to Tucson was supposed to be a stumbling block for Tech.

That didn't prove to be the case. The Red Raiders went into the desert and came out with just the fourth true road win of the McGuire era and it could be argued that the win over the Wildcats was the best road performance from Tech in the past three seasons.

So let's continue to enjoy that victory by looking at the players of the game for the Red Raiders and handing out imaginary game balls to those who led the way.

Texas Tech linebacker Jacob Rodriguez played the best game of his career

The story of the night for the Red Raiders was the defensive performance from a Red Raider defense that was missing four of its top outside linebackers and starting safety Chapman Lewis. Despite the missing pieces, the Red Raider defense help up against an Arizona team that features the top QB/WR combination in the Big 12.

The leader of the attack on that side of the ball was middle linebacker Jacob Rodriguez. The redshirt junior played the best game of his career to help his team come out on top.

Making 13 tackles (to tie his career-high) he was all over the field. What's more, he was credited with a sack, a pass defense, and a forced fumble.

Saturday night, the Red Raiders managed to come away with three takeaways. Two of those were directly because of Rodriguez.

In the first half, he blitzed Arizona QB Noah Fifita and tipped a pass attempt. That caused the pass to flutter into the air and land in the hands of Red Raider defensive tackle Quincy Ledet. Six plays later, the Red Raiders would find the endzone to take a 15-3 lead.

Later in the game, with Tech leading just 22-19 in the final quarter, Rodriguez made the play of the game by chasing down Arizona WR Tetairoa McMillan and punching the ball from his hands allowing the Red Raiders to recover the fumble. That turnover led to Tahj Brooks' third TD of the game on the ensuing possession, the game-winning score.

Rodriguez has 54 tackles this year which puts him on pace for a 100-tackle season. And on Saturday night/Sunday morning, he had his best performance as a Red Raider earning him one of our game balls.

Texas Tech wide receiver Caleb Douglas made several key plays

This offseason, Texas Tech brought Caleb Douglas over from Florida to add a big-play element to the offense. On Saturday night, he had his biggest impact of the season going for 116 yards on just five receptions.

Like Rodriguez, Douglas made two huge plays that helped turn this game in Tech's favor. The first was a 57-yard catch-and-run down the sidelines on Tech's final possession of the first half.

Coming after the Red Raiders picked off the Wildcats in the endzone, that play moved the ball from the Tech 12 to the Arizona 31 with just 15 seconds left in the half. That helped set up Gino Garcia for a 30-yard field goal as time expired to send the Red Raiders to the locker room with an 18-3 lead.

Then, with 3:55 to play in the game and Tech trailing 19-18, Douglas corralled a back-shoulder pass from QB Behren Morton for a 32-yard gain. That moved the ball to the Arizona 24 and eventually set up Garcia for a 41-yard FG to put Tech back on top.

The Red Raider passing game struggled for much of the second half and as a result, Morton threw for only 214 yards for the game. What's more, the Red Raiders' leading receiver, Josh Kelly, was held to just 27 yards on five catches.

Fortunately, Douglas was Tech's go-to receiver against the Wildcats and he accounted for over half of Tech's receiving yards. Therefore, he earns a game ball as well.

Tahj Brooks atones for fumbles, powers the Texas Tech attack

Finally, we have to take some time to appreciate the performance of running back Tahj Brooks. Yes, his night will be partially remembered for the two second-half fumbles that he lost. However, he more than made up for those uncharacteristic mistakes.

For the game, Brooks ran for 128 yards and three touchdowns on just 21 carries. That's an average of 6.1 yards per rush.

That rushing output pushed him into third place on the Red Raiders' all-time career rushing list. Passing Ricky Williams, he now trails only Byron Hanspard and James Gray.

Brooks is proving again that he is arguably the best running back in the Big 12. What's more, he is picking up his yards despite the fact that every opponent knows that he is going to be the player around whom the Red Raider offensive game plan revolves.

No running back is perfect and Brooks would love to have the two fumbles he lost back as they led to six Arizona points. However, when the game was on the line, he came through in the clutch with a game-sealing 32-yard touchdown scamper late in the fourth quarter.

Brooks now has seven TD runs in six games. He's also on pace for 1,358 yards which would put him atop the career rushing list for Texas Tech. And once again against Arizona, he powered the Red Raiders to victory on the ground.