Could TCU go with a two-QB approach at K-State? Gary Patterson doesn’t rule it out
TCU quarterback Max Duggan is playing through a broken bone in his foot. That has forced the offense to limit the QB run game, coach Gary Patterson said.
Patterson would like to see the offense get back to implementing the QB run in its game plan at Kansas State on Saturday, whether it’s Duggan or a backup such as Matthew Downing or Chandler Morris.
“That’s a week-to-week thing, we’ll see how he (Duggan) feels,” he said. “I think it’s important for us to get back to the quarterback run game. We took a lot of it out of the game last week, but I think it’s going to be important for us to win ballgames. Whether that’s him (Duggan) doing it or somebody else doing it.”
Duggan finished with seven carries for 27 yards in last weekend’s loss to West Virginia. He had eight carries for 45 yards against Oklahoma the previous week. When Duggan injured his foot during the Texas Tech game, he finished with six carries for 43 yards.
In games against Cal, SMU and Texas, a fully healthy Duggan had double-digit carries each time.
Asked if Duggan can physically handle an extended workload carrying the ball, Patterson said: “Yeah. He played all last game. Now that you’re playing on turf, it’s different than the one we just played.”
If TCU opts for a second quarterback, Morris has more running credentials than Downing.
Morris rushed for two touchdowns as a freshman at Oklahoma last season. He finished the season with 44 yards rushing on five carries with the two TDs.
At Highland Park, Morris made a name for himself as a running QB. During his final two seasons, he had 1,286 yards rushing and 37 rushing TDs. He would seem like TCU’s best option for a QB run game, but he’s listed at only 5-foot-11, 175 pounds compared with Duggan’s 6-foot-2, 214-pound frame.
In other words, Duggan is built for the power running game compared to Morris being more of a scrambler out of the pocket.
As Patterson said in his postgame news conference after the West Virginia game, “(Morris) runs well but he’s more of a scrambler. We’re not going to run a power with him or the run game that Max runs. It’s a power quarterback run game — not a finesse quarterback run game. That doesn’t mean that Chandler can’t do it.”
Patterson sidestepped a question about Morris being an option during his Tuesday news conference.
“I’m not going to tell Kansas State anything. You guys have sat in these meetings long enough to know that, right?” Patterson said, smiling. “The key is to win ballgames and we need to do what we need to do to go win a ballgame. What we can’t do is to get into the same scenario we were in for the second half last week. We had two picks, a fumble and a turnover on downs. That’s basically four takeaways and that’s hard to win ballgames.”
Those turnovers were why TCU’s offense was shut out in the second half against West Virginia. It marked the first half this season that TCU failed to produce points. The last time TCU was shut out in a half was in 2019 against Baylor.
But, much like the two-QB questions, Patterson refused to tip his hand on his thoughts regarding the play-calling under offensive coordinator Doug Meacham so far this season.
“I’m not telling Kansas State anything,” he said. “I’ve got five games left and all that evaluation will come when I get done with five games. You’ve got to make plays. You can’t turn the ball over. We’re not trying to (turn the ball over). The only one we can control is the call on fourth down when we turned it over on downs. That’s the one the coaches have to change.”
TCU and K-State are set for a 2:30 p.m. kickoff Saturday in Manhattan.
This story was originally published October 27, 2021 at 5:00 AM.
