Backing it up: Hoover's big day leads TCU to 44-11 rout of BYU

FORT WORTH, Texas — There's something about TCU backup quarterbacks.

A year after Max Duggan took over for Chandler Morris and led the Horned Frogs to the national championship game, BYU made backup quarterback Josh Hoover look like a College Football Playoff contender in his first start of the year.

The redshirt freshman from Heath, Texas, completed 37-of-58 passes for 439 yards and four touchdowns with an interception as TCU welcomed BYU into the Big 12 with a 44-11 win Saturday afternoon at Amon G. Carter Stadium.

BYU quarterback Kedon Slovis completed just 15-of-34 passes for 152 yards and an interception with three sacks taken, and LJ Martin ran for 56 yards on 14 carries for BYU (4-2, 1-2 Big 12). Chase Roberts posted a team-high 63 yards on three catches for the Cougars, who averaged just 10.4 yards on 14 catches.

If Hoover's performance — or a 104-yard, one-touchdown performance by JP Richardson — wasn't enough, Emani Bailey averaged 4.7 yards per carry for 61 yards to pace the Frogs to 137 rushing yards. Led by seven tackles from Shad Banks Jr. and six stops and a sack from Namdi Obiazor, TCU's defense held BYU to a season-low 243 yards of offense.

The Cougars might have expected TCU to run the ball with a new quarterback. Or they may have studied Hoover's limited tape and seen a few tendencies with a full week to plan to face him. But what they got was completely unexpected: an offense that threw the ball nearly twice as much as it ran, and for good reason.

"We kind of expected them to come in and run that ball with a new quarterback in there," BYU linebacker AJ Vongphachanh said. "But they did a good job of executing and winning their one-on-ones at the end of the day."

It's the second-worst loss of the Kalani Sitake era at BYU, and the worst since a 40-6 setback to then-No. 7 Wisconsin in 2017. That season ended with a 4-9 record and led to the dismissal of former offensive coordinator Ty Detmer.

"Today they looked a lot like what I saw last year on film," Sitake said of TCU, which was coming off back-to-back losses to West Virginia and Iowa State. "He made some throws that I was not expecting, but they put him in a position to be comfortable and have success."

In the first meeting between the two schools since 2011, TCU (4-3, 2-2 Big 12) picked up right where they left off, extending the Frogs' winning streak to five games and sending a majority of students and a chunk of the 44,599 fans in attendance home planning for the Texas Rangers' ALCS in Houston on Monday by the fourth quarter.

Slovis threw an interception on the Cougars' third play from scrimmage, and Millard Bradford returned it 35 yards for a touchdown to put the hosts up 7-0.

"I think we had a great week of prep, and the offense and defense felt like we got better," said Slovis, shrugging off any notion that the Cougars were rusty after the bye week. "But you've got to go out and do it. I didn't think we did that today; I didn't do it today. I've got to play better, and it starts with me. I think everyone in the building feels the same way. We can do as much as we can to compete, but we've got to go compete on Saturday."

Hoover, who started the first game of his TCU career, doubled the advantage on the Frogs' first offensive possession. The youngster who made his sixth collegiate appearance completed 3-of-5 passes for 66 yards during a seven-play, 68-yard drive to put TCU up 14-0 on a 42-yard touchdown strike to Richardson.

The quarterback who replaced starter Chandler Morris due to an MCL injury looked like he belonged the whole time, hitting 13 different receivers for an average of 11.8 yards per catch.

"This week, I think they (TCU) utilized his talents," Sitake said of Hoover. "He's a really effective thrower, and he's smart with the ball in his hands. He didn't make a lot of mistakes, and I thought he took necessary risks. They just seemed to have a really good rhythm with him, and got chunk yardage and big plays. Credit to them; I don't even think it's all on the quarterback.

"The whole team played great; they were physical, they had good size. Hat's off to them. ... It was a tough game, a tough pill to swallow, but we have no choice but to get better from this."

Was it all downhill from there? Not quite, but pretty close.

The Horned Frogs jumped out to a 24-0 lead after Hoover hit Jared Wiley with a 7-yard touchdown strike before Keelan Marion's 3-yard rushing touchdown got BYU on the board with 3:15 left in the half.

He then opened the second half with his fourth touchdown pass, a 14-yarder to Warren Thompson, to help TCU begin to pull away for good.

In all, the Horned Frogs piled up 584 yards of offense, averaged 6.8 yards per play, converted 12-of-18 third downs, and held the Cougars to 2-of-14 on third down with three sacks, five tackles for loss and two turnovers.

The top-40 team in interceptions pulled down two more picks Saturday, including Eddie Heckard's second of the year and Siale Esera's first of his career. Ethan Slade and Preston Rex posted a team-high eight tackles, and Max Tooley posted six and Vongphachanh five for a defense that didn't register a sack and only had one tackle for loss.

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