No. 9 FB Holds Off Texas Tech, 27-24

By Jerry Hill
Baylor Bear Insider
            Turns out, Benjamin Franklin was right when he said, "Nothing is certain except death and taxes."
            Until Saturday, Texas Tech kicker Jonathan Garibay seemed to have added his name to the list, making his first 13 field goal attempts this season, including a 62-yarder on the final play of the game to beat Iowa State, 41-38, two weeks ago.
            So, when the senior kicker lined up for a 53-yard field goal against the ninth-ranked Baylor Bears Saturday afternoon at McLane Stadium, you just had the feel that this game was headed to overtime. But, not this time.
            Kicking against the wind and facing a good rush up the middle from Baylor, Garibay's kick had the distance but drifted wide left as the Bears (10-2, 7-2) held on for a hold-your-breath 27-24 win over the Red Raiders. And thanks to seventh-ranked Oklahoma State's 37-33 win over No. 10 Oklahoma, Baylor is back in the Big 12 Championship Game for the second time in three years, facing the Cowboys (11-1, 8-1) at 11 a.m. next Saturday, Dec. 4, at AT&T Stadium in Arlington.
            "Everybody knows he can kick," said Baylor senior running back Trestan Ebner. "He hasn't missed one all season. You've got to have a little faith. I had a little faith that he would miss. I think we do a good job of getting pressure on the kicker. I'm just happy he missed."
            The Bears showed just how happy they were, some of the players sliding on the wet turf and others skipping off the field as Baylor recorded its first 7-0 home record at McLane Stadium and first for the program since 2013, the last year at Floyd Casey Stadium.
            "That's something we preached about all offseason is defending our home field," senior linebacker Terrel Bernard said. "To go 7-0 and win out here has been crazy. The home-field advantage has been awesome. The fans come out every single week and support us. It's just been fun, man. I'm glad we were able to do it."
            Sandwiched between two Big 12 Championship Game appearances was a 2-7 finish in a COVID-affected debut season for head coach Dave Aranda last year. From those depths, the Bears rebounded to produce the seventh 10-win season in program history and sixth in the last 11 years under three different head coaches.
            "Coach Aranda has done a great job building the culture here, just bringing everybody together. And we're all aligned on the same path with the same goal in mind," Bernard said. "Like we said in the locker room, he's done an amazing job just getting everybody on the same page and getting everybody moving in the same direction."
            Making his first collegiate start, redshirt freshman quarterback Blake Shapen threw for 254 yards and two touchdowns and had zero turnovers thanks to a critical replay review late in the third quarter that overturned an interception by Tech cornerback Rayshad Williams.
            "There were times that Blake would throw a pass," Aranda said, "and immediately as he threw it, in my my head and maybe my mouth, I'm going, 'Oh, no!' So, for Blake to come from 'Oh, no!' to a really strong 'Yes!' on the very next play is a great statement about him."
            Showing the kind of balance they've had all year, the Bears also got a program-record-tying eighth 100-yard game of the season for Abram Smith with 117 yards and one touchdown on 30 carries. Smith, who had a big fourth-down pick-up with a chance for Baylor to run out the clock, moved up to second place on Baylor's single-season rushing yards list with 1,366.
            Facing another 4^th-and-short with a chance to seal it, Shapen's pass to Smith was batted away by linebacker Colin Schooler to give the Red Raiders (6-6, 3-6) one more shot to tie it up or win it in regulation.
            Moving 53 yards in 10 plays with no timeouts left, Tech QB Donovan Smith completed a 19-yard pass to McLane Minnix on a 4^th-and-7 that got the Red Raiders to the 35 for another last-second field goal by Garibay.
            "I was interested to see the push we would get," Aranda said. "Last year, we did not affect anything. A lot of times when you have those types of field goals, there's a momentum swing, there's an intentionality of what we're trying to get done here. I think we've had a great improvement in that area. The last couple of weeks, we really affected those things. So, in a way, it was strength on strength. So, I was looking at our push and hoping we weren't going to jump offsides or anything like that."
            After Aranda called a timeout just before the snap, Baylor got good pressure up the middle, and Garibay hooked it wide left for his first miss after hitting his first 13 field goal attempts.
            "It would have hurt," said Ebner, when asked about potentially losing his final game at McLane Stadium. "Wins are hard to come by. I'm just thankful for this, no matter what the score is. If we didn't win this, it would have hurt a lot."
            Shapen connected with running back Ebner on a 61-yard pass on the third play from scrimmage, giving the Bears the early 7-0 lead. Ebner finished with a career-high 118 yards on four catches and set the program record for a running back with 124 career catches.
            "They have struggled with some of that in their tape," Aranda said of using Ebner so much in the passing game. "Just having Blake in there, having Trestan and the matchup we had was one of our best matchups. . . . I thought that was a great plan by (offensive coordinator Jeff Grimes, quarterbacks coach Shawn Bell and wide receivers coach Chansi Stuckey)."
            Sixth-year senior Jairon McVea forced a fumble that Mark Milton recovered on Tech's first play from scrimmage, setting up a 28-yard field goal by freshman Isaiah Hankins that made it 10-0 just over four minutes into the game.
            Garibay connected from 46 yards out to cut the deficit to 10-3, but the defense came up with another big play when Raleigh Texada sacked Smith on a backside cornerback blitz and recovered a fumble at the Red Raiders' 24.
            Carrying the ball on five-straight plays, Smith barreled over from four yards out to push the lead to 17-3 with 5:01 left in the half.
            Tech answered with a nine-play, 75-yard drive, capped by Tahj Brooks' one-yard run to make it 17-10 at the half.
            After a scoreless third quarter that and reversed turnovers by both teams, the scoring came fast and furious in the fourth.
            Baylor got it back to a two-score game with a 27-yard field goal by Hankins at the end of a 16-play, 69-yard drive.
            The Red Raiders struck back with Smith's 38-yard TD pass to Minnix, but Ebner had a 26-yard return on a short kickoff to the 42-yard line. Baylor marched 58 yards in 10 plays, with Shapen hitting tight end Ben Sims for the payoff on nine-yard TD pass to make it 27-17.
            It took Tech just two plays to make things interesting again when tight end Travis Koontz took a short screen pass from Smith and turned it into a 75-yard touchdown.
            "We had some communication issues," Bernard said. "They were going tempo, getting on the ball and running some plays pretty fast. We kind of miscommunicated in the back end a little bit. We were playing two different defenses. So, I feel we gave them one there."
            In the end, the Bears had just enough to hold on for the win before a McLane Stadium crowd of 43,901 and eventually book their ticket to the Big 12 title game for a chance at redeeming last month's 24-14 loss to Oklahoma State in Stillwater.
            "I'm proud of the senior class," Aranda said of a group that included 22 players honored before the game. "You think about the ups and downs they've been through. And you think about last year, having the ability to leave and deciding to stay. Just very appreciative of them. I love our senior class. Love what they stand for, and their ability to really believe and trust and be open to those things. I think it's a great lesson for them."

No. 9 FB Holds Off Texas Tech, 27-24

Players Mentioned

Terrel Bernard

Trestan Ebner

Isaiah Hankins

Jairon McVea

Mark Milton

Blake Shapen

Ben Sims

Abram Smith

Raleigh Texada

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