This TCU player was honored by Big 12 for his game against Southern

Derius Davis had an impressive college debut for TCU on Saturday.

The freshman from Louisiana scored two touchdowns, including a 73-yard punt return, and flashed his big-play potential with his speed and elusiveness in TCU’s 55-7 victory over Southern.

So it wasn’t too surprising when the Big 12 named him co-newcomer of the week on Monday.

Coach Gary Patterson said the program is “fired up” that Davis earned those honors, but tapped the brakes on too much praise. After all, Davis also muffed a punt that he managed to recover.

“As always with all young guys, there’s a lot of things he can get a lot better at,” Patterson said on Monday during the Big 12 coaches teleconference.

“We’re fired up for him that he got co-newcomer of the week, but we can get a lot better,”

Davis finished his debut with three catches for 49 yards, including a 12-yard score in the first quarter. The punt return for a score marked the first for a TCU true freshman in his collegiate debut since Deante Gray in the 2012 opener against Grambling State.

Davis, who played at West Feliciana High School in Saint Francisville, Louisiana, wasn’t the only true freshman standout. Fellow receiver Taye Barber also had his first career touchdown reception, a 6-yard catch early in the second quarter.

Both of those touchdowns to Davis and Barber were thrown by sophomore quarterback Shawn Robinson. During the teleconference, Patterson went on to express how pleased he was with Robinson during the opener after watching the film.

Robinson misfired on a few throws, but overall managed the offense well. This is an offense that has a new quarterback in Robinson, four new regulars along the offensive line and several young receivers such as Davis and Barber seeing significant playing time.

“No. 1, he ran the offense,” Patterson said of Robinson. “I thought he stepped in the huddle, he managed it. We wanted him to manage the game and he did that. He had three passing touchdowns and two rushing, five total, and he only played a half.”

Robinson flashed his running ability when he scored on a QB keeper on a 36-yard run, but also had a better sense of awareness by staying in the pocket instead of leaving it by default.

In the end, Patterson is happy to get the first game and all the jitters that come with it out of the way for Robinson and the rest of the team.

“I think the biggest thing is to get that first game over with,” Patterson said. “I think that was the biggest thing – come in and manage it. You don’t want to turn the ball over and we didn’t do that, so those are good things.”

Other notables from the teleconference –

▪ Patterson said the field had a 130-140 heat index during the opener, and he was happy with how his team handled the circumstances. Patterson knew of only one player who received intravenous fluids during halftime.

▪ One of the positives from the opener in Patterson’s mind is that the Frogs’ No. 1 defense only played about 30 snaps. That meant plenty of snaps for younger players to learn and experience game situations. In total, TCU used 80 players in the game.

▪ Patterson pushed for the 11 a.m. kickoff because TCU is losing a day by playing at SMU on Friday this week. That allowed Patterson to grade the film on Saturday night instead of Sunday, and give his players an extra 6-8 hours of rest. Said Patterson: “We had a better practice [Sunday].”

This story was originally published September 3, 2018 at 1:28 PM.