Box Score MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Texas Tech scored touchdowns the first five times it had the football and never looked back in taking down West Virginia 38-17 this afternoon at Milan Puskar Stadium.
 
Jett Duffey at times looked like former Red Raider quarterback Pat Mahomes in the first half, the junior completing 15 of his first 20 pass attempts for 271 yards, including an 81-yard touchdown strike to Dalton Rigdon.
 
He finished the game completing 24-of-34 passes for 354 yards and a touchdown.
 
A WVU defensive line that produced eight sacks 10 days ago against Baylor's Charlie Brewer was unable to get to Duffey at all this afternoon.
 
"They blocked us," Brown said.
 
Duffey's accurate first-half passing to mostly wide-open players in the middle of the field led to four short Red Raider touchdown plunges, two each by Ta'Zahawn Henry and SaRodorick Thompson.
 
It wasn't until 3:36 of the second quarter that West Virginia's defense produced its first stop of the game. By that time the Red Raiders were comfortably ahead 35-10.
 
"We've got to be ready to go defensively and we weren't," West Virginia coach Neal Brown said.
 
Meanwhile, two turnovers also contributed to the Mountaineers' first-half woes. A Douglas Coleman 30-yard interception return to the WVU 24 - his nation-leading eighth of the season - led to Henry's 4-yard touchdown run.
 
Shortly after that, an Austin Kendall fumble late in the first quarter gave Tech the ball at its own 13, and it took the Red Raiders just nine plays to cover the entire length of the field.
 
West Virginia's two first-half scores consisted of Casey Legg's 30-yard field goal on the Mountaineers' opening possession of the game, and wide receiver Isaiah Esdale completing a 24-yard double pass to running back Kennedy McKoy coming out of the backfield early in the second quarter.
 
At the beginning of the second half, West Virginia (3-6, 1-5) took the football from its own 25 to the Tech 6 where Kendall's fourth-down pass to Leddie Brown fell incomplete – one of four red-zone failures for the offense. The Mountaineers' next offensive possession ended at the Red Raider 49 when Winston Wright Jr. coughed up the football following a 10-yard reception.
 
Four minutes later, another miscue thwarted a West Virginia drive after two long Kendall passes to Sam James moved the ball to the Red Raider 17.
 
A second red-zone trick play turned into disaster when Kendall's flea-flicker pass was intercepted by DeMarcus Fields in the end zone and returned to the Red Raider 34.
 
"Fishing," Brown said of his decision to call a flea flicker so close to the goal line. "Was it a good play call? No, because it didn't work but at the same time I think we were zero for our last two or three (in the red zone) and it was just fishing for a play. It was something we've been carrying for a while."
 
That was West Virginia's fourth turnover of the game.
 
"Some of the turnovers were because of missed assignments and missed opportunities in the red zone," Brown said. "To me, the game came down to turnovers and missed opportunities in the red zone."
 
Kendall, who completed 26-of-43 passes for 355 yards, was replaced by Bowling Green transfer Jarret Doege on the final play of the third quarter.
 
Brown said the decision to pull Kendall was because he wanted to get Doege some live game action while still preserving his redshirt.
 
"I thought he did some good things. The same thing that plagued Jarret plagued Austin. We dropped the ball and we didn't do a great job in protection," Brown explained. "I'll say this, I wish quarterback was our problem that needs fixed."
 
A couple of drops ended West Virginia's first offensive drive with Doege behind center, and his second concluded at the Red Raider 4 when his fourth-down pass in the end zone to freshman tight end Mike O'Laughlin fell incomplete.
 
But West Virginia's third possession with Doege late in the fourth quarter gave those remaining in the stadium something about which to cheer.
 
Doege, starting at the WVU 39, completed a couple of short passes to James and Bryce Wheaton for 13 yards. Two plays later, he calmly navigated some pressure in the pocket to fire a bullet to George Campbell for 15 yards to the Texas Tech 31. His next pass to James netted 22 yards to the Red Raider 9, and his final pass to true freshman Tony Mathis coming out of the backfield resulted in a touchdown.
 
Doege's second-half stat line showed 11 completions in 17 attempts for 119 yards and a touchdown.
 
James caught a career-high 14 passes for 223 yards, but that easily could have been much more if not for a couple of drops and two long gainers that should have been touchdowns if he caught them in stride.
 
"He had four drops or it would have been a 300-yard receiving effort," Brown said.
 
Campbell added three catches for 95 yards, including a 50-yarder that also could have been a touchdown if he didn't have to slow up to catch it.
 
Overall, the Mountaineer offense accounted for 549 total yards, despite a run game that once again struggled to get anything going. The Mountaineers netted just 51 yards rushing on 18 attempts. 
 
Consequently, Kendall, Doege and Esdale tried 61 passes.
 
"Offensively, we moved the ball, but it was 20 to 20. In the red zone we didn't score and in this league you've got to score," Brown said.
 
Texas Tech's only second half score was Trey Wolff 24-yard field goal with 10:20 remaining in the game.
 
Brown was appreciative of the 56,573 who showed up this afternoon - and remained despite the Mountaineers falling behind by a big margin in the first quarter.
 
"Because of them, and for them, we will be successful here and there are some growing pains right now. I promise you, nobody is more frustrated with everything that's going on on the football field than me," Brown said. "But we have a high percentage of guys who are going to be back – and not only back for one year but back for three years – and they will get significantly better.
 
"We will do a better job coaching them, and we will put a product on the field that will match the fans that we have," Brown added.
 
The victory boosts Texas Tech's record to 4-5/2-4 with a home game against TCU on the horizon next Saturday.
 
West Virginia is back on the road next Saturday to face 16^th-ranked Kansas State, who lost at Texas.