Alex Delton can't lift sluggish K-State offense in 26-6 loss to TCU

New quarterback, same result.

Alex Delton was unable to spark Kansas State’s offense during a 26-6 loss to No. 6 TCU on Saturday, as the Wildcats continued to fall short against quality competition. They have lost three of their past four games and enter the second half of the season hoping for bowl eligibility instead of a conference championship.

Time remains for K-State (3-3, 1-2 Big 12) to turn things around and achieve some of its preseason goals, but the early results aren’t encouraging. Two of its victories have come against overmatched nonconference opponents, while the other was against winless Baylor. All three of its losses have come against power-conference competition.

The Wildcats couldn’t beat Vanderbilt or Texas on the road. And they didn’t have any luck at all against TCU (6-0, 3-0) at home.

“It’s very frustrating,” K-State right tackle Dalton Risner said. “You look at the expectations we had to start the season, and it is heartbreaking. It is awful. I don’t even want to say it. I expected to be 6-0 right now.”

Fans hoped Delton could add a new dimension to the offense while filling in for an ailing Jesse Ertz, who missed this game with a knee injury after playing hurt in K-State’s past two games, but things didn’t work out that way. The Wildcats missed Ertz’s steady leadership and passing accuracy against a defense that made things hard.

“There are some things that I need to get straightened out,” K-State coach Bill Snyder said. “I appreciate the fact that we wanted to win and they gave a good effort. There are just some things that are not taking place. That falls in my lap.”

TCU quarterback Kenny Hill led the Horned Frogs to an early 13-0 lead, and they dominated from there.

While Hill completed 27 of 37 passes for 297 yards and also ran for 58 yards and a touchdown, K-State had trouble gaining first downs.

The Wildcats finished with a season-low 216 yards, struggling mightily in most areas. But they were worst on third down, missing their first nine conversion attempts. It took them until midway through the third quarter to finally move the chains under pressure.

Much of that fell on Delton. In his first college start, the sophomore completed 11 of 29 passes for 146 yards, while rushing for 39 yards. But it’s not like his teammates were all that sharp. The Wildcats only rushed for 70 yards, and receivers rarely got open.

“Alex really struggled today,” Snyder said. “As I said, he had a lot of help. In that respect it is not all his fault, but he did not play nearly as well as he obviously did the previous week.”

Added Delton: “I feel like I had enough experience. I was a little jittery at the start of the game, but I was fine as the game went on and started seeing things more clear ... It’s unfortunate we couldn’t come out with a win.”

K-State’s struggles weren’t surprising.

This is the type of game K-State coach Bill Snyder traditionally loses. If there is a knock on his long, successful Hall of Fame career it’s that he has rarely defeated top 10 teams. He is now 4-34 against them, with his last victory against a top 10 team coming at Oklahoma in 2012.

TCU was clearly the better team.

Still, the game didn’t swing its way until K-State bungled a string of plays in the second quarter at the goal line.

Here’s what happened: The Wildcats advanced to the TCU 5 following a 33-yard pass to Byron Pringle. Momentum appeared to be on their side when Delton found Pringle in the right corner of the end zone two plays later, but the touchdown was negated by pass interference.

Pringle reached out his left arm and touched TCU cornerback Ranthony Texada on the shoulder before breaking to his right for an easy catch. It was hard to tell if Pringle pushed Texada, or if Texada flopped, but he fell to the ground and a penalty was called. K-State was left facing a third-and-goal from the 26.

Delton fumbled on the next play and TCU recovered. A Pringle touchdown could have made the score 10-6. Instead, the Horned Frogs drove down field for a field goal and a 13-0 lead.

The way K-State was – or, more accurately, wasn’t – moving the ball, the game already felt out of reach.

“We will try to get everyone back into it and ahve the capacity to throw the ball better, obviously,” Snyder said. “We ahve to be able to runa gaisnt teams that are going to do some of the things that TCU did against us, most of it was blitz and work and movement that we have done reasonably wella gainst concepts before. But TCU gave us some secondary pressure taht we could not deal with.”

The Wildcats had to play well on defense and special teams just to hang around. Matthew McCrane connected on two field goals and Nick Walsh helped create good field position with long punts. On defense, D.J. Reed played well in the secondary while Tanner Wood and Will Geary made plays up front.

They did enough to give the Wildcats a shot at pulling to within one score late in the third quarter, but TCU stuffed Justin Silmon at the line of scrimmage on fourth-and-short after they had advanced to the 8. The Horned Frogs maintained a 20-6 lead and pulled away from there.

“It was probably just as big of a tackle on the field as any of them,” TCU coach Gary Patterson of the fourth-down stop. “You roll the dice on the blitz and sometimes you catch them from the back side.”

It was a strange play choice for K-State, which usually prefers QB sneaks in that situation, but this was a strange game. K-State and TCU were supposed take the field for warm ups at about 10 a.m. for an 11 a.m. kickoff, but the game didn’t start until 2 p.m. after a long lightning delay.

Rain fell steadily all morning, and lightning lingered into the afternoon. K-State tried to start the game after a 45-minute delay but weren’t able to. Fans entered and exited the stadium several times before Delton took his first snap

The game began when it was originally scheduled to end. It continued until the sun was going down, with another lightning delay halting play for one hour in the fourth quarter.

Delays can influence players once they take the field, but they didn’t seem to bother the Horned Frogs.

That is one of the main reasons TCU remains atop the Big 12 standings and K-State remains near the bottom.

“We are 3-3, but what are we going to do about it?” Risner said. “Do we do put our heads down and give up on the season? No, we can’t do that. We have six games left. How about we got 9-3? As a leader, that is what I am going to say to the team.”

This story was originally published October 14, 2017 at 6:21 PM with the headline "Alex Delton can't lift sluggish K-State offense in 26-6 loss to TCU."