Texas Tech football 2023 rewatch: Career performances lead Red Raiders past Baylor

When you get the chance to play a bad team, you had better take advantage. That's what Texas Tech did last season in Waco against Baylor.

The fact is, Baylor stunk in 2023. We found that out when the Bears lost their opener to Texas State at home by 11 points and we got confirmation when they finished just 3-9 overall and 2-7 in Big 12 play by the end of the year.

Along the way, they would lose their last five games. What's more, they would drop half of their games on the schedule by double digits.

Interestingly, when they played the Red Raiders, though, they were coming off of one of the most improbable wins of any Big 12 team in 2023. The week prior, Baylor erased a 35-7 third-quarter deficit on the road to beat Central Florida 36-35.

Maybe that caught the Red Raiders' attention and gave Joey McGuire's team a reason to respect the Bears or maybe that game vs. UCF was just a fluke. But whatever the reason, Texas Tech did not let Baylor off the mat in a 39-14 win in Waco that moved the Red Raiders to 3-3 on the year and 2-1 in Big 12 play.

So let's look back at this dominant performance, which was perhaps Tech's most complete game of 2023. And we start by examining how some career individual performances led the way for the Red Raiders.

Steve Linton makes an impact for the only time as a Red Raider

In five seasons as a college football player, former Texas Tech edge rusher, Steve Linton, registered only 7.5 sacks between his time at Syracuse and Tech. Nearly half of that total came last year against Baylor.

That night, facing an awful Baylor offensive line, Linton looked like the dominant player Tech fans were told he would be during the 2023 offseason. He racked up three sacks with two of those jarring the ball loose from Baylor QB Blake Shapen.

Last year, Baylor was just 106th nationally in terms of sacks allowed giving up 2.8 per game. Thus, the Red Raiders should have feasted, especially after jumping out to a double-digit first-half lead.

In all, Tech collected six sacks of Shapen in this game, a season-high. Linton had half of those. But for the rest of the season, he would appear in only two more games and he would not notch any more sacks. At least for one night, though, it appeared as if he had turned the table and was about to become a dominant force for the defense.

Baylor Cupp has his only multi-TD game as a collegiate

Another Red Raider who, like Linton, possessed massive physical gifts but who never lived up to his potential as a collegiate was Baylor Cupp. And like Linton, the former Texas Tech tight end had a career game against the Bears last season.

Between Texas A&M and Texas Tech, Cupp appeared in 34 college games. He found the endzone only four times and two of those scores came against Baylor a season ago.

For the game, Cupp had only two catches for 34 yards with each being a 17-yard TD grab. His first TD put the Red Raiders up 14-0 in the second quarter and his second put them ahead 24-3 near the end of the third quarter.

Tech never got much productivity out of Cupp, a former blue-chip high school recruit who spent his first two seasons at Texas A&M. His most productive game saw him catch only four passes for 65 yards last year against Texas. But like Linton, he managed to break out for one night against Baylor in 2023.

Tahj Brooks sets a career-high in rushing

Heading into this game, everyone expected Tahj Brooks to have a big day. Tech had finally realized he was its best offensive weapon and Baylor had an absolutely terrible run defese.

Those expectations were met in a big way. Brooks ran for 170 yards, a career-high, and a TD on 31 rushes (his 31 attempts was at the time also a career high).

Averaging 5.5 yards per rush for the game, he nearly had 100 yards by halftime. And when Baylor cut Tech's lead to 24-11 early in the fourth quarter, it was Brooks who helped prevent any thoughts of another big Baylor comeback.

On a nine-play touchdown drive that covered 65 yards and answered Baylor's lone touchdown of the game, Brooks handled the ball four times gobbling up 39 yards including a punishing 18-yard TD run to cap things off.

It was the fourth-straight 100-yard game for Brooks. In that stretch, he had over 148 yards three times. For the season, Baylor was 115th nationally against the run allowing 184.9 yards per game on the ground, second-most of any Big 12 team and the Red Raiders exploited that weakness in a huge way.

Behren Morton has his revenge game

We can't put this game to rest without looking at the revenge game that Behren Morton had. The year prior, he played his worst game as a collegiate against Baylor in Lubbock, a 45-17 drubbing by the Bears on the night Patrick Mahomes II was inducted into the Texas Tech Football Ring of Honor.

In that game, the redshirt freshman QB who had just a handful of starts under his belt was befuddled by Baylor's defense. He completed only 11 of 34 passes for 154 yards and one TD while being picked off three times.

Thus, it had to be important to Morton that he played well against the Bears in 2023. Certainly, he accomplished that goal.

Throwing for 180 yards, he had three TD passes and completed 19 of 26 attempts. What's more, his lone interception looked to be the result of his injured throwing shoulder (rather than a poor decision) as he badly underthrew an open receiver who had a step or two on the defense

His three-TD performance set a new high for a single game in his career, a mark he'd match in the Independence Bowl vs. Cal. Morton didn't have to be spectacular vs. Baylor last season because the ground game was dominant but in finding Coy Eakin on a nice back-shoulder fade for one early TD and by connecting with Cupp with a pinpoint throw on a contested ball for another, he got the Red Raiders out to an early double-digit lead, one they would not relinquish the entire evening.