Junior receiver Dezmon Briscoe keeps his head to the turf as Texas Tech celebrates after recovering a fumble for a touchdown during the fourth quarter. Kansas gave up 28 points during the fourth quarter in a 42-21 loss.
Monday, November 2, 2009
Lubbock, Texas — Todd Reesing’s senior campaign — the final go-around for one of Kansas’ biggest playmakers of all time — has struck an abrupt and rather unexpected road block.
The senior quarterback with the flair for the dramatic, the one who led Kansas to an Orange Bowl victory and who has delivered in the clutch countless times before was benched.
Yes, on the plains of Texas and in front a less-than-capacity crowd, Reesing stood on the sideline while freshman Kale Pick jogged to take his place for the final seven minutes of a 42-21 loss that completely unraveled in the fourth quarter.
“He was not able to get anything moving — or at least consistently,” coach Mark Mangino said. “We just felt like, ‘Give Kale Pick a shot.’”
The decision left Reesing and his teammates somewhat surprised.
“I was, I’m not gonna lie,” Reesing said. “At that point we were two possessions down, but by no means was the game over. It’s not my decision obviously. I gave them a reason.”
Still, when senior wide receiver Kerry Meier joined Kansas’ huddle in the fourth quarter and didn’t see the No. 5 jersey, he was admittedly startled.
“I was kind of confused at first,” Meier said. “I thought they had pulled him because he got banged or hit one of those plays. He was getting hit quite a bit throughout the whole game. Then we come out for a series and I see Kale in the huddle, I didn’t know what was going on.”
Reesing’s mistakes have always been tolerated, simply justified as an important part of the quarterback’s home-run mentality. Without it, teammates and coaches said, Reesing couldn’t compete at his highest level.
And it all became part of Reesing’s easy-to-root-for persona — the one fans latched and held on to after Reesing led Kansas to a comeback victory against Colorado in his first game in 2006.
Yet for the third consecutive game, Reesing produced costly miscues, which resulted in points for Kansas’ opponents. On top of that, Reesing struggled to find receivers and couldn’t effectively move the offense throughout the game.
This time Mangino simply decided enough was enough.
“I’m at a loss for words to understand what has happened the last two weeks,” Reesing said.
Leaning against a white wall in a tiny makeshift interview room, Reesing admitted that he suffered a groin injury against Colorado that has continued to nag him.
As Reesing noted after the game, though, he wasn’t replaced because of an injury, which he said didn’t hinder his performance. Instead, it was his less-than-average performance that kept him planted on the sideline.
True, Reesing’s tale is undoubtedly the headline and most prominent story from Saturday’s disappointing finish. But the burden of the loss is not Reesing’s alone.
Far from it, in fact.
“If it was just him, I would have taken him out of the game a long time ago and put Kale Pick in,” Mangino said. “But it’s not just him. You’ve got receivers, veteran guys, dropping passes all over the field. And I don’t like it. It’s not the way we play football at Kansas. It’s not how we do things here.”
Kansas’ offense — the unit expected to carry the Jayhawks this year — struggled as a whole from start to finish on Saturday.
Reesing completed 20 of 35 passes for just 181 yards. He also had two fumbles.
Junior wide receiver Dezmon Briscoe had an uncharacteristic number of drops and the usually sure-handed Meier fumbled deep in Kansas territory, setting up a Texas Tech touchdown.
Kansas lost four fumbles in the game.
“It’s tough because we go through a week of practice and it looks like we’re ready to roll,” Meier said. “And then we come out and do something like this on Saturdays the past few weeks. It kind of throws me for a curveball.”
It also overshadowed three quarters of tough, turnover-forcing defense from Kansas.
All week, Kansas’ players and coaches repeatedly emphasized the need for the defense to create pressure and turnovers. And the Jayhawks certainly delivered.
Kansas’ defense returned a fumble for one touchdown while the unit forced and recovered another fumble that positioned the offense at Texas Tech’s two-yard line.
“We squandered a pretty good defensive performance for about three and a half quarters,” Mangino said. “We played very well on defense. But we left the defense on the field way too long.”
It certainly appeared that way.
The Red Raiders scored four touchdowns in the final quarter after the Jayhawks took a 21-14 lead in the final seconds of the third quarter.
In turn, Kansas’ offense provided little support for the defense as the Jayhawks failed to score in the fourth.
“It’s hard to deal with it,” Reesing said. “We were so ready to get into this season with this senior class and the experience we had on offense and to underperform the last few weeks has been hard to deal with.
“We’ve continued to say we we’re going to bounce back but the last few weeks we haven’t. At this point, it’s gut-check time.”
— Edited by Amanda Thompson
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