Shutting 'Em Up

After a week of talk and more from Texas State's fans and critics, the Red Raiders silenced everyone very quickly on Saturday night.

Following a week where critics and fans were putting the Red Raiders on upset alert heading into their matchup with Texas State, who beat Houston 30-13 last week, Texas Tech came out and quickly silenced those critics and fans on Saturday night.

Red Raider safety Cody Davis assisted with the silencing of the record 33,006 fans in attendance with his 88-yard interception return for a touchdown in Tech’s 58-10 pummeling of the Bobcats.

“Oh that’s the best feeling you can get,” Davis said about having the crowd go silent after his interception. “Home game it gets pretty pumped, but whenever you hear that silence in a stadium there’s nothing to match that.”

For the second straight week Tech’s offense came out and put up ridiculous offensive numbers with Red Raider senior quarterback Seth Doege orchestrating his offense to perfection.

After calling his performance “average” against Northwestern State last week, Doege finished the night against the Bobcats going 25-for-32 for 319 yards and five touchdowns, which tied his career-high for touchdowns thrown in a single game.

“It felt great, we had a lot more opportunities this week and we took advantage of them,” Doege said. “That very first play should have been a touchdown, I just misthrew it, and after that we just started rolling. I feel like I threw the ball pretty well tonight. I’m pleased about my performance, but I’m excited about this team.

“We came out here and did exactly what we wanted to do.”

Depth has been one thing Tech head coach Tommy Tuberville has preached all through the spring, summer and fall camps and through the first two games of the season, the depth of the Red Raiders is very apparent.

With all sorts of pieces in place this week, Tuberville said he was happy with how they were able to open the playbook a little bit more this week.

“That was a good road win for us. We put ourselves behind the eight ball to come play here in the new stadium,” he said. “Our players responded; they came out to play early. We went to a 4th and 1, and we just dropped it. On the reverse, our defense responded. Offensively, we went after it. I was proud of the whole team and the coaches. We didn’t play that well on offense last week, but we made up for it this week. We are starting to build some depth. We had a couple injuries coming in, and we had a lot of guys make plays.”

With Eric Ward out of the game against Texas State, due to a concussion he suffered this past week, Tech had to turn to some new faces to contribute from the wide receiver position.

Junior Javon Bell and freshman Jakeem Grant finally were able to make their presence felt for the Red Raiders as both reeled in five catches a piece, Bell going for 81 yards and a touchdown and Grant gaining 78 yards.

Senior wide receiver Darrin Moore made his debut of the 2012 season and gave the Bobcats headaches for the second-straight year.

Moore had a coming out part against Texas State in 2011, making 12 catches for 221 yards, and continued his dominance on Saturday grabbing five balls for 73 yards and two touchdowns.

“This was the kind of game where they just couldn’t guard all of us,” Tech tight end Jace Amaro, who finished the game with three catches for 55 yards and a touchdown, said about the wide receivers. “This was the kind of game where we just have so many weapons, and Eric Ward wasn’t even with us today and he’s one of our best receivers … You can just tell that this offense is running and if we keep this up we can make a pretty good run at it.”

Now Texas Tech will go back to Lubbock and get ready for the New Mexico Lobos and the Red Raiders do take some things away from this win, but know the work does not end here.

“I think a little confidence,” Davis said of what they take away from the win. “With every win that’s always good, get the W, go on to the next week and keep working.”