Breaking News: Young team goes on the road in the conference play and looks like a young team.
This review is based off of Bill Connelly's Five Factors to winning football games. The five factors are efficiency, explosiveness, field position, turnovers, and finishing drives.
End of half drives and garbage time situations are not included in any of the efficiency, explosiveness, drive finishing, or field position calculations.
This advanced stat glossary will come handy to those of you who are less familiar with the five factors.
Efficiency
| Team | Success Rate | Pass SR | Run SR | Standard Downs SR | Passing Downs SR |
| Texas | 47.54% | 55.56% | 41.18% | 54.35% | 26.67% |
| Kansas State | 50.00% | 48.28% | 51.06% | 54.72% | 39.13% |
| National Avg. | 40.20% | 40.20% | 41.00% | 45.80% | 30.30% |
| Team | 1Q SR | 2Q SR | 3Q SR | 4Q SR |
| Texas | 54.55% | 62.50% | 56.52% | 26.32% |
| Kansas State | 57.14% | 56.00% | 57.14% | 25.00% |
Texas Offense vs. Kansas State Defense
In my preview, I argued that Texas should throw the ball more often on standard downs due to the relative strengths of Kansas State's defense. I also thought that Texas would have a decent amount of success if they did throw on standard downs, because that has been Shane Buechele's best asset thus far in his young college career.
The Texas offense played almost exactly as I expected them to. The Longhorns only ran the ball 51.1% of the time on standard downs, and they were much more successful with the passing game on standard downs than they were when running (65.2% SD passing SR vs. 41.7% SD rushing SR).
It's a good thing that Texas was able to stay on schedule as a result of this strategy change, because they were (once again) poor on passing downs. Buechele played a solid game on Saturday, but the Texas offense was utterly incapable of producing any sort of passing success when they were forced into unfavorable down and distances (0% PD passing SR).
Texas was able to avoid complete disaster on passing downs because of a running game that was able to pick up some of the passing attack's slack (40% PD rushing SR). The offensive staff responded by relying on the running game on passing downs, with a PD run rate of 71.4%.
The offensive staff deserves credit recognizing the strengths of their team relative to the strengths of their opponents and attacking Kansas State accordingly.
Kansas State Offense vs. Texas Defense
Coming into this game, I thought that Texas would struggle to force a run heavy Kansas State team into passing downs, but do a decent job of getting the Wildcats off the field on the few occasions that did get them off schedule.
I was only sorta correct.
As expected, Kansas State ran the ball often on standard downs (66% of the time), and did so with solid success (51.4% SD rushing SR). The Wildcats were also efficient with the pass on standard downs, with a SD passing SR of 61.1%.
Kansas State's standard downs efficiency was not that surprising, but their passing downs efficiency was a bit higher than I anticipated. Texas did an okay job when they could force Kansas State to actually throw the ball on passing downs (KSU's PD passing SR was 27.3%), but they were unable to stop the Wildcats' run game (50.0% PD rushing SR).
The quarterback run game was the biggest issue for the Texas defense on passing downs. Jesse Ertz had 4 of Kansas State's 6 successful passing downs runs, and he did so on "only" 7 attempts.
Explosiveness
I use yards per successful play to measure explosiveness. I like this statistic because it isolates efficiency from explosiveness by looking at how explosive a team is on successful plays only. I am also including the percentage of success plays that qualify as explosive plays under Tom Herman's big play definition (runs of at least 12 yards and passes of at least 16 yards).
| Team | Yards per Successful Play | Yards per Successful Run | Yards per Successful Pass | XP to SP |
| Texas | 11.59 | 8.57 | 14.40 | 27.59% |
| Kansas State | 9.39 | 8.75 | 10.50 | 13.16% |
Texas Offense vs. Kansas State Defense
Texas was the more explosive team on Saturday, but that was not due to an offense that was creating a lot of big plays.
With the exception of a couple of outstanding performances against California and Oklahoma State, this Texas offense has struggled to create explosive running plays. Saturday's game against Kansas State was more of the same, as the Longhorns had no runs greater than 16 yards. It's probably time to accept that this is the new normal for the Texas offense.
Meanwhile, the passing game continued their recent trend of creating one super long pass a game without offering much else in terms of explosiveness. Excluding the second quarter bomb to Devin Duvernay, the Longhorns only had two passes of at least 16 yards.
Kansas State Offense vs. Texas Defense
Preventing explosive passing plays has been Texas' biggest weakness on defense, but for the second consecutive week they did a solid job of limiting big gains through the air. The only explosive passing play that they allowed was a 31-yard competition to Deante Burton on Kansas State's first position, and Kris Boyd actually had pretty good coverage on that pass.
Field Position
| Team | Average Starting Field Position |
| Texas | 68.80 |
| Kansas State | 74.70 |
Texas won the field position battle, largely because of a pair of turnovers that set the Longhorns up with excellent field position.
Turnovers
This table is based off of the back-of-the-envelope turnover luck calculation that I wrote about a couple of weeks ago.
| Passes Defensed | Fumbles Forced | Expected Turnovers Forced | Actual | Difference | Points | |
| Kansas State | 4 | 1 | 1.3 | 0 | -1.3 | -6.5 |
| Texas | 4 | 2 | 1.8 | 3 | 1.2 | 6 |
For the second time this season, Texas received a ton of turnover luck in a close loss.
These turnovers were incredibly valuable, despite the fact that Texas ended the game with 0 points off turnovers. The first fumble recovery prevented a surefire touchdown, and the second fumble recovery stopped a promising Kansas State drive in Texas territory.
Often times, the points your defense doesn't allow as a result of turnovers are just as valuable as points your offense scores off turnovers.
Drive Finishing
| Teams | Drives | Scoring Opportunites | Points per Scoring Opportunity |
| Texas | 10 | 7 | 3.00 |
| Kansas State | 10 | 5 | 4.80 |
Texas reciprocated the good luck they received from Kansas State's turnovers by having an uncharacteristically miserable day finishing drives.
Poor play in the redzone marred an otherwise solid performance by the Texas offense. The Longhorns created plenty of scoring chances, and average drive finishing would have resulted in Texas scoring about 33 points*.
Some of Texas' poor drive finishing was due to Kansas State's defense tightening up with their backs against the wall, but most of their problems were self-inflicted. A bad snap on a on third and goal from 9, a short missed field goal, and a pair of dropped passes on forth downs all resulted in empty scoring chances for the Longhorns. These plays are not indicative of broader issues for the Texas offense (particularly the drops), and the Longhorns are a bit unfortunate that they happened at the worst possible time.
*College football teams average 4.67 points per scoring opportunity.
Individual Statistics
Kansas State
| Cmp | Att. | Yds. | TD | Int. | Yards per attempt | Success Rate | |
| J. Ertz | 20 | 27 | 171 | 1 | 1 | 5.34 | 48.28% |
| Rushes | Yards | Yards per Attempt | Success Rate | Opp. Rate | Highlight Yards/Opp. | |
| J. Ertz | 14 | 92 | 6.57 | 57.14% | 57.14% | 3.69 |
| C. Jones | 12 | 81 | 6.67 | 66.67% | 58.33% | 3.79 |
| J. Silmon | 11 | 58 | 5.27 | 36.36% | 27.27% | 7.33 |
| A. Barnes | 4 | 17 | 4.00 | 66.67% | 33.33% | 0.50 |
| J. Hubener | 1 | 9 | 9.00 | 0.00% | 100.00% | 2.00 |
| D. Warmack | 1 | -2 | -2.00 | 0.00% | 0.00% | N/A |
| W. Dimel | 1 | -3 | -3.00 | 0.00% | 0.00% | N/A |
| Targets | Catches | Catch Rate | Yards | Yards per Target | Yards per Catch | Success Rate | |
| B. Pringle | 7 | 4 | 57.14% | 42 | 6.00 | 10.50 | 42.86% |
| D. Heath | 7 | 7 | 100.00% | 41 | 5.86 | 5.86 | 71.43% |
| D. Burton | 6 | 4 | 66.67% | 53 | 8.83 | 13.25 | 50.00% |
| I. Zuber | 3 | 2 | 66.67% | 9 | 3.00 | 4.50 | 33.33% |
| C. Jones | 2 | 2 | 100.00% | 14 | 7.00 | 7.00 | 50.00% |
| W. Dimel | 1 | 1 | 100.00% | 12 | 12.00 | 12.00 | 100.00% |
Texas
| Cmp | Att. | Yds. | TD | Int. | Yards per attempt | Success Rate | |
| S. Buechele | 17 | 24 | 222 | 2 | 0 | 7.26 | 55.56% |
| Rushes | Yards | Yards per Attempt | Success Rate | Opp. Rate | Highlight Yards/Opp. | |
| D. Foreman | 24 | 124 | 5.17 | 41.67% | 37.50% | 3.83 |
| S. Buechele | 6 | 25 | 4.17 | 33.33% | 66.67% | 0.38 |
| T. Swoopes | 2 | 11 | 5.50 | 100.00% | 50.00% | 1.50 |
| K. Porter | 1 | 1 | 1.00 | 0.00% | 0.00% | N/A |
| Targets | Catches | Catch Rate | Yards | Yards per Target | Yards per Catch | Success Rate | |
| D. Leonard | 6 | 3 | 50.00% | 27 | 4.50 | 9.00 | 50.00% |
| C. Johnson | 5 | 4 | 80.00% | 22 | 4.40 | 5.50 | 60.00% |
| J. Warrick | 3 | 3 | 100.00% | 19 | 6.33 | 6.33 | 66.67% |
| A. Foreman | 3 | 2 | 66.67% | 17 | 5.67 | 8.50 | 66.67% |
| J. Oliver | 2 | 1 | 50.00% | 23 | 11.50 | 23.00 | 50.00% |
| L. Joe | 2 | 1 | 50.00% | 7 | 3.50 | 7.00 | 50.00% |
| D. Duvernay | 1 | 1 | 100.00% | 80 | 80.00 | 80.00 | 100.00% |
| D. Foreman | 1 | 1 | 100.00% | 20 | 20.00 | 20.00 | 100.00% |
| J. Heard | 1 | 1 | 100.00% | 7 | 7.00 | 7.00 | 100.00% |
*Notes: Sacks are counted as passing attempts and are factored into the yards per attempt figure presented with the passing stats.
Opportunity Rate is the percentage of a runner's carries that gains at least 5 yards. It is a measure of a runner's efficiency, although I also like to use success rate to judge a runner's efficiency.
Highlight Yards per Opportunity is a measure of a running back's explosiveness. You can find its definition in the advanced stats glossary that I linked earlier in this post. The national average for highlight yards per carry is about 5 yards. For more context on these rushing stats, I encourage you to check out 2015's rushing stats.
Final Thoughts
All things considered, Kansas State and Texas played a pretty even football game. Kansas State was a bit more efficient than the Longhorns, but Texas made up the difference with an explosiveness advantage (Texas ended the game with a yards per play advantage of 5.7 to 5.4).
It's pretty rare for a team to lose when they are +3 in turnovers and move the ball better than their opponents, but Texas was just self-destructive enough in tight moments to swing the game back in the Wildcats' favor.
