TCU Horned Frogs eager to bounce back against rival SMU football in rivalry game Saturday
Oftentimes in college football it’s not about losing, it’s about how you lose.
Losing to a team with the talent of UCF is nothing to be discouraged about, especially early in the season. But when you lose the way the Horned Frogs did, blowing multiple three-possessions leads in the second half, well that’s a cause for concern.
With the Battle for the Iron Skillet looming on Saturday, coach Sonny Dykes said he’s hopeful that the Horned Frogs won’t let one collapse snowball into many more.
“How do we bounce back? Dykes said during his press conference on Tuesday. “I think last year we lost Game 1 and I think with the way we lost and how it unfolded it rocked us for the rest of the year. For us we have to do a good job of getting over that on Saturday. We have a good football team, I really do believe that.”
Last year, the Horned Frogs served as the perfect hosts for Deion Sanders and the Colorado Buffaloes’ breakout party with red zone turnovers and a defensive collapse. TCU never regained its confidence and struggled in close games the rest of the way.
Even if UCF turns out to be a Big 12 contender, it won’t ease the pain of blowing a lead at home. It’s certainly the type of loss that can stick with a team if the Horned Frogs don’t have the mental toughness to move on. On Tuesday the Horned Frogs were saying all the right things about making peace with the defeat.
“We just have to have that mentality that the sun’s going to come up the next day,” defensive lineman Caleb Fox said. “The only thing we can do is work to learn from the mistakes and make sure they don’t happen again.”
The most frustrating aspect about TCU’s mistakes, like a false start at the 1-yard line in the third quarter, is that most of them occurred in the second half after a first half that included some of the best football Dykes has ever coached.
“I think we played in the first half of that game, the best football since I’ve been at TCU,” Dykes said. “Even in the 2022 season, I’m not sure we ever played against a quality opponent as well as we did in the first half. We can build off that, it wasn’t great in the second half.
“We made some mistakes that have hurt us in the past and can’t do those. But if we can replicate that kind of first half performance for a full game then we’ll have a chance.”
That’s why the timing of Saturday’s battle against SMU is perfect. What better way to take your focus off the sting of defeat than to focus on your crosstown rival?
Veteran and new Horned Frogs alike are all eager to face the Mustangs, who also enter Saturday’s contest coming off a disappointing loss to BYU.
“This rivalry means a lot,” Fox said. “I’m a big fan of rivalry games, there’s just an extra juice going into those games. I’m not a big trash talk person, but it’s probably going to come out this game.”
A win over SMU would be huge for the morale of the locker room and it could be another sign that this team is different from last year.
Good teams don’t let one loss turn into two or three. The question facing TCU ahead of the rivalry matchup is which version of the Horned Frogs will we get?
The one that dominated in all three phases of the game in the first half against UCF? Or the one that couldn’t get a stop or a timely first down in the second?
There’s more than bragging rights on the line as TCU hopes to get its season back on the right track.
This story was originally published September 18, 2024 at 10:37 AM.
