You never know what you are going to get out of a team coming off of an open date. Fortunately, Texas Tech put its best foot forward on Saturday by taking apart Arizona State 53-25 in Lubbock.
With the win, the Red Raiders move to 6-0 and will end the weekend as one of only six undefeated FBS teams. What's more, they will cross the halfway mark of the regular season in first place in the Big 12.
The win was thanks to one of the most dominant first-half performances we've seen from Tech in a conference game. A pick-six by Ben Roberts on Arizona State's first possession set the tone, and J'Koby Williams and the Red Raider offense did the rest.
The junior running back had touchdown runs of 62 and 38 yards in the first half, helping his team rack up over 400 yards of offense by halftime. Meanwhile, QB Will Hammond had a 9-yard TD run in the first quarter and a beautiful 11-yard TD pass to Coy Eakin right before halftime as Tech raced out to a 43-10 lead at the intermission.
After that, the rest of the game devolved into a tickle fight. Arizona State went to its backup quarterback, and Texas Tech went to a soft zone defense in the second half, making the game look like a seven-on-seven summer scrimmage.
Though Tech was outscored 15-10 in the second half, this was still the type of dominant showing that the Red Raiders needed to put on their resume. While beating an unranked team is not going to make national headlines, Tech finally started to chip away at the narrative that they are not a worthy top-10 team because they haven't been impressive enough in their wins this season.
For the Red Raiders, style points are going to matter moving forward, and against ASU, they amassed plenty. This is the type of win that people have been wanting to see from Tech all season. Now, the talk about Tech being unimpressive can start to die down.
Tech needed a lopsided win over a respected program and they got one on Saturday. Whatever this team did on its week off, it worked to perfection. Now, here are a few rapid reactions to what transpired in game six of the season.
J'Koby Willliams has signature game for Texas Tech
J'Koby Williams might be the most dynamic running back in the Big 12. On just 11 carries, he racked up 165 yards. That's an average of 15.0 yards per carry.
In the first game of the season without Cam Dickey, who sat out due to an ankle sprain, Williams stepped up in a huge way. In all, Tech ran for 260 yards on just 37 attempts. That's an average of 7.0 yards per run. It was by far the best rushing day of the season for the Red Raider offense.
Texas Tech may have the best linebacker trio in the nation
Once again, the Red Raider linebackers were terrific. With Roberts' score in the first quarter, the Red Raiders now have four pick-sixes from their three linebackers, and all three have at least one.
The trio of Roberts, John Curry, and Austin Romaine combined for 17 tackles (two for loss), one touchdown, two interceptions, and 0.5 sacks. Romaine led the team with eight tackles as he continues to find ways to impact games after a slow start to the season. That trio is the driving force behind this defense, and they were fantastic in the first half of this game.
Texas Tech pass rush wreaks havoc
Far too often this season, Tech's pass rush has been only good enough to get close to the passer. That changed against ASU.
The Red Raiders racked up six sacks on the day against a Sun Devil offense that entered the game having given up only nine all season. A.J. Holmes led the way with 1.5 sacks, while Trey White, LaDamion Guyton, Mateen Ibirogba, Marcus Ramone-Edwards, and Romain all got to the QB. Hopefully, that trend will continue moving forward.
Will Hammond was efficient and effective
Hammond had a strong showing in his eighth career start. Given Tech's ground-game dominance, he wasn't asked to be superhuman, but he still made important plays.
He finished 18-of-26 for 232 yards through the air with one TD. He also carried the ball six times for 25 yards and a TD.
Most importantly, he did not turn the ball over. That's the second game in a row in which Hammond has not given the ball away after starting the year with a giveaway in the first four contests.
Texas Tech limits Arizona State's dangerous WR duo
Finally, Tech did a great job of taking the ASU wide receiver duo of Reed Harris and Omarion Miller out of the equation, especially in the first half. For the game, they combined for just 121 yards on 11 catches. That's just three more yards than Harris himself was averaging per game coming into the day.
In the first half, when the game was put away, that duo caught only three passes for 34 yards. Though they got more involved in the second half, with Harris even catching a touchdown pass, they were a complete non-factor when the game was up for grabs. Credit to the Texas Tech defense for stepping up to that challenge.
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