Baylor ran 87 offensive plays Saturday night against TCU.

Eighty-seven.

The Bears picked up 23 first downs, converted four fourth downs and gained 310 yards. They kept extending drives and giving themselves opportunities to put points on the scoreboard.

They never scored a touchdown.

TCU walked out of Waco with a 17-6 victory, and after watching this defense struggle to close out games earlier in the season, I think that deserves some recognition.

I’ve been critical of this team when it was warranted. Saturday, the defense earned some credit.

Not just for holding Baylor to six points, but for how it did it.

TCU Holds Baylor to 3.6 Yards Per Play

Baylor came into Saturday riding a four-game winning streak and fresh off scoring 55 points against Arizona State. DJ Lagway had thrown four touchdown passes in that game, and the Bears had rushed for 244 yards.

As our Baylor scouting report detailed, this offense had given TCU plenty to prepare for.

TCU held that same offense to 54 rushing yards and 3.6 yards per offensive play.

Think about that for a second.

Baylor needed 87 snaps to gain 310 yards. Lagway attempted 53 passes, completed only 22, and his longest completion went for 21 yards.

That’s an offense having to work for almost everything it gets.

One of the things people sometimes overlook about playing good defense is that you don’t have to make a spectacular play every snap. Sometimes the most important thing you can do is make sure the offense doesn’t get what it wants on first down.

A one-yard gain on first down might not get anybody out of their seat. But when you follow it with a sack or another negative play, suddenly the offense is facing third-and-long.

Now you’ve changed what they can realistically call. Instead of having their entire playbook available, they’re trying to figure out how to get out of a situation your defense created.

That’s exactly what happened on one of Baylor’s first-quarter possessions.

Hudson Hooper stopped Dawson Pendergrass for a one-yard loss on first down. Koron Hayward followed with a nine-yard sack.

Third-and-20 from Baylor’s own 10-yard line.

Incomplete pass. Punt.

That’s how good defense works. One player does his job, another player takes advantage of the situation, and suddenly the offense is sending its punt team onto the field.

Hayward deserves plenty of recognition for his performance. He finished with three sacks, accounting for three of TCU’s four on the night.

When one player consistently puts an offense behind the chains, everybody else on that defense benefits.

Baylor Kept Getting Chances. TCU Kept Denying Touchdowns.

The most impressive part of Saturday’s defensive performance wasn’t that Baylor couldn’t move the football.

At times, it could.

The Bears had two scoring drives in the second quarter that totaled 26 offensive plays.

Twenty-six plays produced six points.

That’s a lot of football for a defense to play without giving up a touchdown.

Anybody who has played defense knows how frustrating those long drives can become. You make a stop, get them into third down, and somehow they find a way to move the chains.

Now you’ve got to line up and do it again.

Baylor converted four fourth downs Saturday. That means TCU had multiple opportunities to get off the field and couldn’t capitalize.

I’m not going to pretend that’s something the defensive staff will be happy about when they watch the film.

But here’s what I did like.

Even when Baylor extended possessions, TCU didn’t allow those drives to turn into touchdowns.

The Bears reached the red zone three times and came away with just one field goal from those trips. They finished 6-of-21 on third down.

In the second half, Baylor had six possessions.

Three ended in punts. One ended in an interception. The final two ended with TCU stopping Baylor on fourth down.

Six possessions. Zero points.

Jamel Johnson contributed the interception, and Kylin Jackson forced and recovered a fumble in the first half.

Against BYU, TCU held the Cougars to 216 yards but allowed a 72-yard touchdown drive when it needed a stop.

I said then that 216 wasn’t the number that mattered. Seventy-two was.

Saturday, 310 wasn’t the number that mattered.

Six was.

That’s the difference between playing good defense for most of a game and playing winning defense when it counts.

TCU’s First Two Possessions After Halftime Changed the Game

As good as the defense played, I thought the most important stretch of Saturday’s game involved both sides of the football.

TCU led 7-6 at halftime.

That was anybody’s game, especially with Baylor playing at home.

The Frogs came out of the locker room and needed only three plays to go 75 yards.

Jaden Craig connected with Jordan Dwyer for 67 yards, then found Ka’Morreun Pimpton for an eight-yard touchdown.

Just like that, TCU led 14-6.

Baylor got the ball back and picked up a first down, but TCU’s defense forced a punt.

Then TCU’s offense did something completely different.

Instead of another explosive scoring drive, the Frogs put together a 14-play, 73-yard possession that took 6:26 off the clock and ended with a Nate McCashland field goal.

That’s a sequence I really liked.

The offense hit Baylor with an explosive play. The defense followed with a stop. Then the offense stayed on the field, moved the chains and gave its defense some time on the sideline.

Those are three possessions that complement each other.

TCU went from protecting a one-point halftime lead to controlling an 11-point game.

That doesn’t mean everything offensively was fixed, but it showed this team could make the plays necessary to take control when the opportunity presented itself.

Before kickoff, I asked TCU to break the script and win the situations that mattered. That stretch provided a good example of what I wanted to see.

TCU’s Offense Still Needs a More Consistent Running Game

Craig finished with 294 passing yards, two touchdowns and an interception.

Dwyer caught six passes for 150 yards, while Ed Small added seven receptions for 91 yards and a touchdown.

Those are productive performances, and the passing game deserves credit for creating explosive plays when the running game wasn’t consistently moving the football.

But there are still some concerns.

TCU finished with just 33 net rushing yards.

Now, college football statistics can make that number a little misleading because sacks and kneel-downs count against rushing totals.

Craig lost 31 yards on four sacks, and TCU also lost eight yards on kneel-downs.

That doesn’t mean the running backs combined for only 33 yards.

Landon Walker gained 36 yards on six carries.

Still, when you look at the overall rushing production, this offense has to find a way to run the football more consistently. The concerns outlined in our TCU-Baylor preview by the numbers haven’t all disappeared.

The four sacks are another concern, although I wouldn’t automatically put every one of those on the offensive line without reviewing the film.

Sometimes it’s a missed protection assignment. Sometimes the quarterback holds the ball too long. Sometimes the defense simply wins the matchup.

We’ll have a better understanding of that after watching the tape.

The eight penalties for 85 yards are another issue that needs attention.

I give the offense credit for making the plays it needed to win. I also think there are some obvious areas that need improvement.

Both things can be true.

Did TCU Take Advantage of the Bye Week?

That was one of my biggest questions heading into Saturday.

After the losses to UCF and BYU, I wanted to see whether TCU used the extra time to address the things that had been hurting this football team.

I don’t think one game proves that everything was corrected.

But I do think Saturday provided some encouraging evidence.

Defensively, the Frogs played well against the run, created negative plays, forced turnovers and didn’t allow Baylor into the end zone.

More importantly, they didn’t fall apart when the game reached the situations that had caused problems earlier in the season.

That tells me something positive happened during the break.

The offense still has work ahead of it, and eight penalties aren’t exactly evidence of a team that has eliminated its mistakes.

But I’m not interested in finding reasons to criticize a team just because I’ve been critical of it before.

When players improve, they deserve to hear that too.

Saturday, TCU’s defense earned it.

What the Baylor Win Means for TCU in Big 12 Play

TCU is now 3-3 overall and 1-2 in Big 12 play.

Nobody should confuse one victory with having everything figured out. The Frogs still need better consistency offensively, fewer penalties and continued improvement as they move through conference play.

But Saturday wasn’t just another win over a rival.

Baylor had scored 55 points in its previous outing.

TCU held the Bears to six.

Baylor ran 87 offensive plays and never scored a touchdown.

For a defense that had already shown it could limit an opponent’s yardage but struggled to finish when it mattered, that’s a significant step in the right direction.

As I wrote in Earned Perspective about TCU’s need for reliable depth, there’s a difference between having the ability to make a play and being dependable enough to make it when your team needs you.

Saturday, TCU’s defense was dependable.

Eighty-seven opportunities for Baylor to score a touchdown. Not one of them ended in the end zone.

That’s a defensive performance worth recognizing.

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