TCU vs. Texas: Game Grades, Analysis for the Longhorns

The Texas Longhorns were totally overwhelmed by TCU on Thanksgiving Day, falling to the Horned Frogs by a 48-10 margin.

Quarterback Tyrone Swoopes will shoulder most of the blame for the loss for his five turnovers, including two that were returned for scores. The sophomore was booed by the home crowd and will need as much bowl practice as he can handle to get over this one.

But, if Texas had a decent offense, this one might have been manageable thanks to the defense. That's saying something when you look at the night Quandre Diggs had.

Positional Unit	1st Half	2nd Half
Passing Offense	F	D
Rushing Offense	D	F
Passing Defense	B+	D
Rushing Defense	A	C
Special Teams	C	D
Coaching	C	C-

Game Grades for the Longhorns

Passing Offense

Can you believe Tyrone Swoopes threw for 305 yards and two touchdowns less than two weeks ago? He just looked out of sorts the entire night, playing his worst game of the season by far.

If there's a bright side in this one, it's wideout Armanti Foreman. The freshman turned in another big play for this offense, this time taking a screen pass 73 yards for Texas' lone touchdown of the game. He'll be Texas' No. 1 receiver next season.

Rushing Offense

The offensive line was completely overmatched by the TCU front, which blew up several plays before the ball was even handed off. There was nowhere for Johnathan Gray or Malcolm Brown to go.

Swoopes actually led the team with 61 yards on 15 carries, but most of those came against a prevent defense in the first half. Take away those 44 yards, and the Longhorns averaged 1.4 yards per carry.

Passing Defense

Once again, the Texas pass rush did its job its pressuring the opposing quarterback. Trevone Boykin was far more uncomfortable than the box score will show, lofting several ill-advised passes downfield.

Unfortunately, the Longhorn defensive backs just couldn't make a play on the ball, finishing with one interception on no less than four chances. Quandre Diggs will be sick when he watches the game film after dropping a pick and getting routinely out-muscled by Josh Doctson.

Rushing Defense

The Texas front wore down late, which is to be expected when the offense can do nothing with the ball. Sure, TCU ripped off a couple of garbage-time runs and scored touchdowns on short fields, but nobody's watching this team and then saying the defense is the problem.

Special Teams

Nick Rose's 47-yard field goal is far outweighed by Cameron Echols-Luper's 53-yard punt return and Diggs' muffed punt. Those two plays added 10 points to TCU's total, which is inexcusable when you're trying to upset a Top 5 team.

Coaching

How much blame belongs to the coaches versus the players? Young quarterbacks are going to make mistakes no matter how much you coach them, and inexperienced offensive lines will get pushed around. The coaches also can't catch an interception for the defensive backs.

That said, you would have liked to see more of an effort to manufacture touches for guys like Foreman and Daje Johnson. It'd also be great if special teams played a mistake-free game some time before Comet 67P passes by our planet again.