West Virginia holds off Texas
BY Associated Press
Sunday, October 07, 2012
10/07/12 at 6:57 AM
Geno Smith passed for four touchdowns, leading No. 8 West Virginia to another wild shootout win in the Big 12, this time taking out No. 11 Texas 48-45 on Saturday night in Austin, Texas.
Smith, who has 24 touchdown passes this season without an interception, hit Stedman Bailey with a 6-yard score with 10:50 left to play. Andrew Buie ran for 207 yards and two touchdowns, the second giving the Mountaineers a critical 10-point lead late.
West Virginia (5-0, 2-0) didn't seal the win until recovering an onside kick with 14 seconds left after Texas scored a touchdown on a pass from David Ash to Marquise Goodwin.
Joe Bergeron scored four touchdowns, all on short runs, for Texas (4-1, 1-1), which is 2-7 at home in conference games the since 2010.
Smith was 25-of-35 passing for 268 yards in a game he had to be sharp. Texas' aggressive defense hit him early and often and forced a second quarter fumble that the Longhorns recovered for a touchdown.
But just as he did when West Virginia ran up 70 points on Baylor a week earlier, Smith made all the big throws when the Mountaineers needed them in a game where every possession was critical. West Virginia went 5-for-5 on fourth downs.
Buie was just as important to West Virginia's ability to carve up the Texas defense. He averaged 6.7 yards against a Texas defense that continues to struggle with tackling.
The Texas defense was aggressive with its pass rush and it gave the Longhorns a chance to win.
The fumble recovery for a touchdown sparked a first-half rally that brought Texas back from a 21-7 deficit to a 28-27 halftime lead. The Longhorns forced another fumble by Smith in the fourth. But Texas couldn't capitalize when an errant snap sailed past Ash, leading to a 16-yard loss before Anthony Fera missed a 41-yard field goal attempt that would have tied the score at 41-all.
Fera, who transferred from Penn State, missed the first four games with a groin injury.
Iowa St. 37, No. 15 TCU 23: In Fort Worth, Texas, Jared Barnett threw three touchdowns to Josh Lenz, who later had a scoring toss of his own on a trick play, and Iowa State ended the Horned Frogs' FBS-best 12-game winning streak.
It was the first Big 12 home game for conference newcomer TCU (4-1, 1-1), which played without suspended quarterback Casey Pachall.
Barnett was 12-of-21 passing for 183 yards and ran nine times for 30 yards in his first start this season for the Cyclones (4-1, 1-1).
The Frogs had won a nation-best 25 conference games in a row, the first 24 while winning the Mountain West championship each of the last three seasons.
Lenz had TD catches of 51 and 74 yards in the first quarter.
Trevone Boykin started for TCU and was 23-of-40 passing for 270 yards with a touchdown and three interceptions.
No. 7 Kansas State 56, Kansas 16: In Manhattan, Kan., John Hubert ran for 101 yards and four touchdowns on just 10 carries, and Collin Klein had two touchdowns running and throwing for Kansas State.
Klein finished with 129 yards passing and 116 yards rushing to help the Wildcats (5-0, 2-0 Big 12) pile up more than 50 points for the third straight year against Kansas. They've won four straight against the Jayhawks (1-4, 0-2) since Bill Snyder returned to the sideline.
The longtime Kansas State coach probably had some choice words for his team at halftime, when a slew of mistakes resulted in a modest 21-14 lead. But the Wildcats scored four touchdowns in the third quarter, three in a span of about 5 minutes, to put the game away.
Original Print Headline: W. Virginia holds off Texas late
