Highlights: here
Final Stats: here
TCU head coach Sonny Dykes discusses the loss: here
TCU running back Emani Bailey discusses the loss: here
TCU quarterback Josh Hoover discusses the loss: here
TCU wide receiver Jo Jo Earle discusses the loss: here
Oklahoma head coach Brent Venables discusses the win: here
Oklahoma
defensive coordinator Ted Roof discusses the win: here
Oklahoma
offensive coordinator Jeff Leddy discusses the win: here
Oklahoma
defensive back Billy Bowman discusses the win: here
Oklahoma
running back Gavin Sawchuk discusses the win: here
Oklahoma
cornerback Woodi Washington discusses the win: here
Oklahoma
offensive lineman McKade Mettauer discusses the win: here
By Tom C. “Midnite” Burke
For the second consecutive season, TCU head football coach Sonny Dykes has led the Horned Frogs football team to an historic season.
Last season, of course, Dykes led the Horned Frogs into the National College Football Championship Playoff. TCU became the first football program from Texas to qualify for the National Championship Playoff.
The Frogs beat Michigan 51-45 in a Playoff semifinal game in the Vrbo Fiesta Bowl before falling to Georgia 65-7 in the national championship game this past January 9.
One instance was in 2020, when LSU went 5-5 during the COVID-impacted season.
The other time was 2016, when Michigan State went 3-9, after going 12-2 the previous season.
The last team to play for a national championship one season and fail to qualify for a bowl game the next season was Texas.
The Longhorns played for a national BCS championship for the 2009 season, losing to Alabama, 37-21, in the Rose Bowl on January 7, 2010.
For the 2010 season, the ‘Horns went 5-7 and did not qualify for a bowl game.
TCU lost its last three-of-four games to finish the season 5-7 (3-6 Big 12). Over their past 15 games, the Frogs are 6-9. After two seasons under Dykes, TCU is 18-9.
With such a forlorn season behind Dykes and the Frogs, there’s not much left from last season’s magical run at a national championship except for a few tattered souvenir T-shirts, some dusty trophies and a College Football Playoff graphic in the upper northeast corner of the east side of Amon G. Carter Stadium.
Dykes and the Frogs were the toast of college football last season. Now there’s wonder as to whether TCU’s success in 2022 was a fluke or a flash-in-the-pan, and Dykes is on the hot seat to prove otherwise in 2024.
TCU’s loss to the Sooners made a Texas-Oklahoma Big 12 Conference Championship game possible in the last Big 12 season for the Longhorns and Sooners. Oklahoma State averted that nightmarish scenario with a 40-34 double overtime victory over BYU on Saturday, November 25.
The 19th-ranked Cowboys (9-3, 7-2), which earned second place by virtue of a tie-breaker victory over Oklahoma during the regular season, will play seventh-ranked Texas (11-1, 8-1) in the Conference Championship Game on December 2 in AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas. Kickoff is scheduled for 11 am (Central). ABC will televise the game.
Texas defeated Texas Tech 57-7 on November 25 in Austin. The ‘Horns still have visions of being one of the four teams selected to play for a national championship, but that dream is a long-shot.
In other season-finales involving Big 12 teams:
- Iowa State (7-5, 6-3), snowballed Kansas State (8-4, 6-3), 42-35
- West Virginia (8-4, 6-3) slipped past Baylor (3-9, 2-7), 34-32
- Kansas (8-4, 5-4), pounded Cincinnati (3-9, 1-8), 49-16
- UCF (6-6, 3-6) dominated Houston (4-8, 2-7), 27-13
The 2023 Big 12 Conference regular-season standings:
- Texas,
8-1
- Oklahoma State, 7-2
- Oklahoma, 7-2
- Iowa State, 6-3
- Kansas State, 6-3
- West Virginia, 6-3
- Texas Tech, 5-4
- Kansas, 5-4
- UCF, 3-6
- TCU, 3-6
- Houston, 2-7
- BYU, 2-7
- Baylor, 2-7
- Cincinnati, 1-8
Nine of the 14 Big 12 teams are bowl eligible: seventh-ranked Texas, 12th-ranked Oklahoma, 19th-ranked Oklahoma State, 25th-ranked Kansas State, Iowa State, West Virginia, Texas Tech, UCF and Kansas.
TCU joins four other Big 12 teams that are not bowl eligible: Baylor, Houston, BYU and Cincinnati.
The University of Houston responded to the Cougars’ losing season by firing head football coach Dana Holgerson, who previously was the head football coach at West Virginia.
Baylor University responded to the Bears' losing season by announcing that head coach Dave Aranda would return for his fifth season as head coach of the program.
Other Texas Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) teams that are bowl-eligible include SMU, UTSA, Rice and Texas State.
Other Texas FBS teams that are not bowl-eligible include UTEP (3-9), Sam Houston (4-8) and North Texas (5-7).
Not too elite company for the Horned Frogs, who at the end of last season were playing, and losing to, Kansas State in the 2022 Big 12 Conference Championship Game, and were hanging with such national powers as the Georgia Bulldogs, Michigan Wolverines and Ohio State Buckeyes.
Georgia has followed up its national championship season with a 12-0 record and No. 1 ranking. Michigan is 12-0 and ranked second. Ohio State is 11-1 and ranked sixth.
Besides last season’s Fiesta Bowl, the last bowl game TCU played in was the infamous 2018 Cheez-It Bowl. The Frogs defeated California 10-7 in overtime.
Since the Bluebonnet Bowl in 1984, the Horned Frogs have played in 22 bowl games, including the 2011 Rose Bowl, which they won, 21-19 over Wisconsin, and last season’s national championship game.
TCU's losing record this season was its third in the last five years and fourth in the last eight years.
Obviously, TCU’s Big 12 colleagues this season weren’t impressed by what the Frogs accomplished last season. TCU beat only one conference team this season that it had beaten last season – Baylor.
The Frogs beat Oklahoma last year, 55-24, in Fort Worth. But this year’s game was different, right from the beginning.
Oklahoma’s first play from scrimmage was a 50-yard pass completion.
The Sooners led 42-16 at halftime and if not for a 22-point third quarter by TCU the final score might have been worse than the 65-7 Inglewood Massacre.
Nonetheless, it was bad enough.
The 114 combined points were the most combined points in a Big 12 game over the last three seasons.
The 69 points laid on the Frogs by the Sooners are the most points TCU has allowed in a game since the Horned Frogs lost to Texas Tech 70-35 in 2004.
Two of some of the highest-scoring losses in TCU football history have now taken place under the watch of Dykes and his two-year defensive coordinator, Joe Gillespie, who plays an unconventional 3-3-5 scheme that is not popular, to say the least, with TCU fans.
Georgia’s 65 points against the Frogs were the most scored by a team in a College Football Playoff (CFP)/ Bowl Championship Series (BCS) title game.
The 65 points tied for the most points scored against a team ranked in the Associated Press top four.
Georgia’s 58-point win was the biggest margin of victory in any national championship game dating back to the start of the BCS era in 1998, eclipsing USC’s 55-19 win over Oklahoma in January of 2005.
The 58-point margin of victory by Georgia was the largest ever against a team ranked in the Associated Press top four (10 more than Army 48, Notre Dame 0 in 1945).
The Bulldogs’ 58-point win was the largest margin of victory in a postseason FBS game. Not just a national championship game – the worst loss of every bowl and every other postseason FBS game that has been played. Ever!
The maulings by the Bulldogs and Sooners are reminiscent of some of TCU’s most embarrassing losses on the gridiron, including those during the dreadful football seasons through the 70s and the 80s.
Remember Alabama 45, TCU 0, in 1975?
How about Texas 69, TCU 7, in 1969, or Texas 58, TCU 0, in 1970.
And, of course, Texas 81, TCU 16, in 1974, and Texas 51, TCU 26, in 1980.
And Nebraska 64, TCU 10, in 1976, and the Cornhuskers 56, the Frogs 14, in 1975.
Ohio State routed TCU, 62-0, in 1969.
Texas Tech blasted the Frogs, 63-7, in 1985.
Texas A&M drilled TCU, 59-10, in 1976, 52-23 in 1997, 53-6 in 1985, and 56-10 in 1990.
Besides the 69 points, TCU’s defense gave up 607 yards to Oklahoma; 400 passing yards and 207 rushing yards. OU scored five touchdowns on the ground and three touchdowns through the air. The Sooners rounded out their scoring onslaught with an interception-return for a touchdown and two field goals.
Oklahoma quarterback Gabriel Dillon carved up TCU’s secondary, often having enough time against TCU’s defensive line to eat a slice or two of pumpkin pie before completing another pass.
Dillon completed 24-of-38 passes for 400 yards and three touchdowns. He completed four passes of 25 yards or more, including two for more than 50 yards.
Oklahoma wide receiver Drake Stoops, the son of former Oklahoma head coach Bob Stoops, caught 12 passes for 125 yards and one touchdown.
OU running back Gavin Sawchuk rushed 22 times for 130 yards and three touchdowns.
Against Oklahoma’s defense, the Horned Frogs’ offense responded with a respectable 520 yards.
TCU redshirt freshman quarterback Josh Hoover completed 32-of-58 passes for 344 yards. He threw four touchdown passes, tying a personal-best, and he scored a touchdown on a three-yard run. The five touchdowns are a career-best.
This was Hoover’s sixth game as the Frogs’ starting quarterback. He took over the role against BYU, on October 14, after starter Chandler Morris suffered a knee injury in the previous game, a 27-14 loss to Iowa State.
Hoover now is 2-4 as a starter. Previously under his leadership, the Frogs beat BYU and Baylor, and lost to Kansas State, Texas Tech and Texas.
Against Oklahoma, TCU running back Emani Bailey had 150 rushing yards on 21 carries. This was his sixth 100-yard effort of the season. His 1,209 rushing yards in 2023 place him ninth for a season in TCU history.
Bailey had a 32-yard touchdown run in the third quarter, which gave him a rushing touchdown in four consecutive games.
TCU senior tight end Jared Wiley had a career-best eight receptions, including two touchdowns, to give him a team-best eight receiving scores on the season.
Junior wide receiver JoJo Earle had a career-high 94 yards receiving on four catches, his most at TCU. His previous best was 85 yards for Alabama against Mercer in 2021. Earle had a six-yard touchdown reception in the first quarter.
Defensive highlights for the Horned Frogs against the Sooners were few and far between.
TCU
senior linebacker Jamoi Hodge had a career-best 14 tackles, including 1.5 for
loss, to surpass his previous best of 13 at West Virginia last season.
Junior linebacker Shad Banks Jr. had a career-high 11 tackles.
Sophomore safety Bud Clark had his team-best third interception of the season.
Junior lineback Nambi Obiazor had his first career fumble recovery off an Oklahoma muffed punt.
With Oklahoma moving from the Big 12 to the Southeastern Conference (SEC) after this season, TCU's loss to OU will be the last football game between the Sooners and Horned Frogs for the foreseeable future.
It now remains to be seen for which TCU players and coaches the game will be the last for them as a Horned Frog.
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