A lengthy lightning delay couldn’t hinder the high-powered offensive attack of No. 21 Texas Tech and Behren Morton as the Red Raiders stumped struggling Oregon State 45-14 Saturday afternoon in Lubbock, Texas.
Morton had a career day, finishing with a career-high 464 yards in three quarters. He added four touchdown passes and completed 23 of his 35 attempts with an interception as the only blemish.
Coy Eakin and Terrance Carter Jr. torched the Beavers (0-3) secondary, with Eakin finishing with six catches for 139 yards and Carter Jr. hauling in six as well for 102 yards. They had a touchdown apiece.
After a nearly two-and-a-half hour lightning delay that paused the game after six plays, Morton came out firing for the Red Raiders (3-0) on the third play back with a perfectly thrown ball in the corner of the end zone to Eakin for 38 yards.
Morton followed it up with another long score, this time 61-yards to Caleb Douglas to make it 14-0 with 6:27 left in the first. The two teams then traded interceptions, and Texas Tech turned its short field into a J’Koby Williams 30-yard screen pass touchdown to make it 21-0.
The Red Raiders ended their first-half scoring with a seven-play, 80-yard drive that finished with Williams punching it in from 3 yards out.
Williams had a productive day overall with 48 yards on the ground and 116 through the air.
It was quite the opposite for Oregon State, who suffered again from self-inflicted wounds. Maalik Murphy threw two interceptions in Texas Tech territory, and got sacked with no timeouts left to end the first half.
Earlier in the half, the Beavers missed a 47-yard field goal.
Murphy completed 25 of 46 passes for 282 yards with two interceptions and one touchdown. David Wells Jr. had six catches for 103 yards.
The Beavers were held to just seven rushing yards
Morton finished his day by leading two more scoring drives for the Red Raiders; a 23-yard touchdown to Carter and a 21-yard field goal by Upton Bellenfant to push it to 38-0 by the end of the third.
Cameron Dickey scored a 4-yard touchdown run to push the lead to 45-0 with 10:43 left.
The Beavers got on the board late in the fourth by way of two Murphy touchdown passes; a 6-yarder to Bryce Caufield and a 26-yarder to Karson Boschma.
