Those of who are moderate to olds (i.e. have seen more than a decade of Tech football) we remember a lot of teams starting out slow.
The 2008 team which is the best we've had in the last 20 years struggled out of the gate with Eastern Washington and had a late score to make a rock fight with Nevada look somewhat respectable for a team that spent most of the season in the Top 10 team and was ranked as high as #2 late in the season.
The 1997 team which went 5-3 in the Big 12 and beat two ranked teams along the way lost to North Texas (Tech was on probation so couldn't go bowling).
The 1999 team lost to North Texas and beat #5 A&M the very next week. The 2000 bowl team beat North Texas 13-7 by the skin of it's teeth after a game winning catch by UNT that should have been caught was dropped.
2002 Team blew out Clemson in the bowl game but struggled with 3-9 SMU (who was worse than the record indicated) in game 2.
2004 beat TCU 70-35, Nebraska 70-10, and blew out #4 Cal in the bowl but lost to New Mexico in game 2.
2006 took OT to beat UTEP in game 2.
The list goes on and on, but those are examples of teams that turned out to be decent or good that had inexplicable losses or close games early. This year's losses to Wyoming and WVA would fall into that category although both of them look much better now than they did at the time.
Now that we've had a couple of games that were blowout wins, one on them on the road at a place we haven't won in awhile, are we turning into the team we thought we were? We looked great in the second half against UH, but after giving up some gobs of yards that game I figured maybe the score said more about Houston than it did us. But the D looked really solid against Baylor, we blew them off the line on both sides of the ball and stuffed them in several key situations. That might be the first game we looked legit other than having the late lead against Oregon.
IMO our best shot at this point is 8-4 (I just don't see us winning at UT). 8-4 would be disappointing compared to preseason expectations, but at this point I think any of us would take it. 7-5 would be disappointing, 6-6 would be very disappointing, and anything less than that would be considered abject failure (in my opinion).
KSU - W
@BYU - W (although this one scares me -- might be tougher than any other game save UT)
TCU - W
@KU - L
UCF - W
@UT - L
At this point I'm thinking 7-5 and really wishing we could get a do-over on the Wyoming and WVU games. What say RRS?
The 2008 team which is the best we've had in the last 20 years struggled out of the gate with Eastern Washington and had a late score to make a rock fight with Nevada look somewhat respectable for a team that spent most of the season in the Top 10 team and was ranked as high as #2 late in the season.
The 1997 team which went 5-3 in the Big 12 and beat two ranked teams along the way lost to North Texas (Tech was on probation so couldn't go bowling).
The 1999 team lost to North Texas and beat #5 A&M the very next week. The 2000 bowl team beat North Texas 13-7 by the skin of it's teeth after a game winning catch by UNT that should have been caught was dropped.
2002 Team blew out Clemson in the bowl game but struggled with 3-9 SMU (who was worse than the record indicated) in game 2.
2004 beat TCU 70-35, Nebraska 70-10, and blew out #4 Cal in the bowl but lost to New Mexico in game 2.
2006 took OT to beat UTEP in game 2.
The list goes on and on, but those are examples of teams that turned out to be decent or good that had inexplicable losses or close games early. This year's losses to Wyoming and WVA would fall into that category although both of them look much better now than they did at the time.
Now that we've had a couple of games that were blowout wins, one on them on the road at a place we haven't won in awhile, are we turning into the team we thought we were? We looked great in the second half against UH, but after giving up some gobs of yards that game I figured maybe the score said more about Houston than it did us. But the D looked really solid against Baylor, we blew them off the line on both sides of the ball and stuffed them in several key situations. That might be the first game we looked legit other than having the late lead against Oregon.
IMO our best shot at this point is 8-4 (I just don't see us winning at UT). 8-4 would be disappointing compared to preseason expectations, but at this point I think any of us would take it. 7-5 would be disappointing, 6-6 would be very disappointing, and anything less than that would be considered abject failure (in my opinion).
KSU - W
@BYU - W (although this one scares me -- might be tougher than any other game save UT)
TCU - W
@KU - L
UCF - W
@UT - L
At this point I'm thinking 7-5 and really wishing we could get a do-over on the Wyoming and WVU games. What say RRS?
