MMQB: How to win game one

Well well well we made it!

As of Sunday at 9pm (the time that this is being written) we are still on to play Iowa State this Saturday which means it is FINALLY the first game week of the season. All the game week nerves and excitement is of course coming with it.

After watching most of the Big 12 look absolutely terrible in their debuts, I am both nervous and excited for the season now. There could be a lot of Big 10 style games that have final scores of 13 to 6 (can’t wait to gouge out my eyes) but am I here for it, it’s 2020 let’s get weird. Frankly just happy to have some TCU sporting event to get excited about (in addition to soccer, of course, which has started their season 1-0-1).

In the past handful of seasons, when we play in Ames it seems like we catch Iowa State right when they are peaking (or when we are falling apart) and the Frogs have fallen off the rails up there. Thankfully, we have played them better down in Fort Worth and haven’t lost to them on our own field since our first year in the Big 12. That being said...this year we are not sure what to expect with literally anything so again anything could happen.

TCU has still yet to play a game to shake the rust off and Iowa State is going to be 2 weeks removed from being “upset” by a good University of Louisiana team (hence the quotations). They are likely going to be in a bad mood and are going to be looking to take it out on the Horned Frogs.

Obviously, I am not looking forward to thinking about the uncertain TCU offense all week due to the quarterback situation BUT I am chomping at the bit to see the running backs get after it on Saturday. That’s been the biggest thing that I have been excited about all off season. The Texas High school football dream team that we have running the ball for TCU - all 3 of the backs that are likely to be featured all run the ball hard. Evans, Foster, and Barlow - THREE. HEADED. MONSTER.

How that stacks up to the Iowa State defensive front? Well that really depends on the OL line play for TCU, but I do like our chances. If we can just get some momentum early and make Iowa State play from behind from the jump then we can play on our terms and not have to worry ourselves about playing catch up instead of “try and keep up”.

The Cyclones of course have Brock Purdy AKA Corn Jesus taking snaps under center, and even though he had a down game against Louisiana I wouldn’t bet on him replicate that poor performance against the Frogs. He’s a good runner, and while the last time he played us a lot of his yards on the ground only came on a handful of runs - we cannot let him do that again. If the Frogs can get ahead early and turn Purdy into a one dimensional passer, then that’s a huge advantage for us since it’ll play to our likely biggest strength - the secondary.

BOTTOM LINE: Get ahead early, run the dang ball since it will likely be our strength this year, and take away the other team’s best player’s biggest strength...real earth shattering formula there I know.

Alright everyone.

It’s game week.

We’re tired of having down seasons.

Let’s hope the Frogs start this season off right.

THE UNLIKELY BUT MOVIE WORTHY JOURNEY TO 11-0 STARTS THIS WEEK!