Eric Morris spent the last week or so telling anybody who would listen that him returning to his alma mater, leading his North Texas squad to take on the Texas Tech football team, was about anything other than himself.
By the end of Saturday’s 66-21 thrashing at the hands of the Red Raiders, the Mean Green coach admitted his homecoming was anything other than sweet.
“Overall,” Morris said, “no bueno.”
Morris used many descriptive words to break down his team’s performance in Jones AT&T Stadium. Few of them were positive. The Shallowater native and former Red Raider receiver praised Tech’s ability to deflate his team early, called his team’s running attack “awful” and looked bummed about how the day transpired.
“We’re a better football team than we showed today,” Morris said, “but we got out-played, out-coached, out-everything today. Embarrassed by it, quite frankly.”
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Three interceptions were part of a historic 35-point second quarter for Texas Tech, leading to a record-tying 52-point showing in the first half.
Morris admitted two of those picks attributed to quarterback Chandler Morris (15-of-27, 162 yards, 2 TDs) were the fault of North Texas receivers. In that he is correct. Bralyn Lux’s pick-6 was on the QB for throwing behind his intended receiver, but ones gathered by Bryce Ramirez and Chapman Lewis came about after balls popped off UNT receivers into the air.
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Texas Tech totaled just a hair under 600 yards of total offense (598) and the UNT coach said the majority of it can be pointed to the Red Raider running the ball. Tahj Brooks made his return to the lineup and needed just one half to collect 109 yards and a touchdown on 17 carries, averaging 6.4 yards. Brooks missed last week’s loss to Washington State with an arm injury.
“I think Tahj Brooks may be the best back in the whole entire nation,” Morris said. “I think having him back early, you saw what he can do. We knew that was a big part of their game plan because they want to get him involved and they did a great job marching down the field running the football.”
With Brooks successful on the ground, Behren Morton was able to operate in play-action and run-pass option plays, resulting in several of his five total touchdowns ― four through the air to four different receivers and a 10-yard rushing score on a play fake to Brooks.
“I thought they were able to establish the run early,” Eric Morris said, “and kind of went back to them being able to throw the ball over our heads once we had to commit to the run a little bit.”
UNT offensive lineman Jett Duncan couldn’t quite explain why the Red Raiders shut down the Mean Green rushing attack (34 carries for 135 yards, most coming in the second half against Tech’s backups). Eric Morris said the Red Raiders showed improved pass defense against the Cougars and doubled those efforts against his squad on Saturday.
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All of it added up to a return to his roots Morris would like to forget.
“We just took turns making mistakes on all three sides of the ball,” Morris said.
