Kingsbury Says Team Lacks Killer Instinct After 59-45 Win
Kliff Kingsbury did not take much positive away from the Red Raiders' week one win against Sam Houston State.
Most notably, Kingsbury called out his team for lacking a killer instinct.
"Uneven play... Guys not making plays, lots of drops, lots of penalties that stall drives, so not very good," Kingsbury said in a post-game press conference.
Kingsbury said that Jakeem Grant had a good game on special teams, but as a whole he wasn't impressed with receivers, calling their play "very average." Starting quarterback Pat Mahomes seemed to be the only bright spot for Kingsbury.
"I thought Pat moved around and protected the ball fairly well," he said.
If the fan in me is watching this press conference, I'm glad that Coach Kingsbury felt his offense played poorly in a 59-point output.
"The killer instinct... Finishing games. It was 59 - 31, we have the ball and we have the chance to put it away and we let them linger and flounder around," he said about his final take away from the game, concluding: "Everyone was OK with it and we gotta get past it. It's not good enough."
This was a much better showing than 2014 as far as week one is concerned, and Big 12 Player of the Week Patrick Mahomes had a lot to do with it.
He went 33-53 passing with 425 yards and four touchdowns. While he did throw an interception off of a tipped ball, he controlled the ball and the offense well. He also added almost 50 yards himself on the ground.
Even with the improvement from last season, it seems like the overall tone of the fan base was negative after this game. I don't know exactly what fans expected, but they should probably get used to what they saw Saturday.
You had a balance of 60 passes to 30 rushes on offense. The penalties Texas Tech received were not crippling. We won the turnover battle. And most importantly, we scored more points than the other team.
This is what Texas Tech is. Hopefully, the team can do it at least five more times this season.
Is that good enough? Maybe not, but it's better than last year and improvement is something that hasn't been associated with Texas Tech Football in a long time. And if this team does stumble upon a killer instinct, watch out - that's when they'll get dangerous.