TCU is back home for conference play Saturday night, and the challenge comes with plenty of baggage: a top-10 BYU team rolling into Amon G. Carter Stadium for a 6:00 p.m.
CT kickoff on Oct. 3.
The Horned Frogs are trying to keep one early-season problem from snowballing. A loss would drop TCU to 0-2 in Big 12 play, something it has not done since 2013.
And the timing is notable, because this is the first top-10 team to visit Fort Worth since 2023, when No. 7 Texas escaped with a 29-26 win.
TCU has had its share of success in these spots. The Frogs beat No.
2 Michigan in 2022, and later that same season knocked off No. 8 Oklahoma State at home.
Under Sonny Dykes, TCU is 3-1 against ranked opponents at home and 8-5 overall in those games. The Frogs have also won two straight against ranked teams, finishing last season with victories over No.
24 Houston and No. 16 USC.
This matchup has been tight over the years. TCU leads the all-time series 7-6, and the teams have split their 10 meetings as Big 12 opponents. Overall, Saturday will be the 14th meeting between the programs.
BYU, meanwhile, comes in with recent history on its side. The Cougars beat TCU 44-13 last year, snapping a five-game losing streak in the series and setting their largest margin of victory over the Frogs. BYU is 6-0 against TCU when allowing fewer than 30 points, and 0-7 when it gives up more than that number.
There’s also a coaching thread here. Dykes knows BYU well from past stops.
He was at Cal when BYU quarterback Christian Stewart beat Jared Goff and the Golden Bears 42-35 in 2014. He also coached against BYU in 2007 and 2008 while at Arizona, with BYU winning the first meeting 20-7 before Arizona answered with a 31-21 win.
Dykes’ father, Spike, who coached at Texas Tech, was a good friend of LaVell Edwards, and both ran similar passing offenses.
Defensively, TCU has been sturdy through four games, allowing just 12.5 points per game. That mark is second best in the Big 12 and 14th nationally. One of the Frogs’ most reliable targets has been Jordan Dwyer, who has 10 career 100-yard receiving games, the fourth most among active FBS players.
BYU and TCU have a longer shared history than most conference matchups, with meetings in the Western Athletic Conference and Mountain West before reconnecting in the Big 12. The programs played twice in the WAC, in 1996 and 1997, and six times in the Mountain West from 2005 through 2010. Last year’s result was one of BYU’s most complete wins of the season, and now TCU gets the rematch at home.
In Other News...
TCU Let A Winnable Upset Slip Despite Its Best Defensive Effort
Rain and defense set the tone at Amon G. Carter Stadium, where TCU gave No. 10 BYU everything it could handle in a 17-10 loss. The Horned Frogs kept the Cougars uncomfortable for much of the afternoon, with their defense doing enough to turn a ranked opponent into a grind and give TCU a real chance to steal a signature win on a rough day for offenses.
But the Frogs could not cash in often enough, and the missed field goal late loomed especially large once BYU finally found its opening. Bear Bachmeiers late touchdown run delivered the difference for the Cougars, leaving TCU to sort through another reminder that a strong defensive showing still has to be matched by cleaner work on the other side of the ball. [Read more 🡒]
BYU Just Proved It Can Win Even When Things Get Uncomfortable
The Horned Frogs had the kind of night that can linger for a while in Fort Worth, one where the defense did enough to keep things within reach but the offense never found a steady rhythm. Against No. 10 BYU, TCU hung around into halftime and leaned on a defense that limited the Cougars through the air and held up against the run, but the inability to build sustained drives kept the pressure on every snap.
In a 10-7 loss that dropped TCU to 2-3, the larger concern is not just the result but how hard it was for the Frogs to manufacture momentum when the game tightened up. The defense gave them a chance against a ranked opponent, yet the offenses inconsistency left too little margin for error, and that combination has become a familiar problem for a team trying to steady its season. [Read more 🡒]
TCUs Offense Is Turning A Big Strength Into An Early Crisis
TCUs defense has been doing plenty to keep the Horned Frogs in games, and on some nights it has been good enough to turn the whole operation into a grind. Under Sonny Dykes, this has quietly become one of the better defensive units in the country, sitting inside the top 15 nationally in scoring defense. Even in the loss to No. 10 BYU, the Frogs made life difficult for Bear Bachmeier and held him to 62 passing yards, the kind of effort that usually gives a team a real chance to steal a win.
The problem is that the offense has not held up its end of the bargain against Power Four competition, where TCU is averaging just 11 points a game. That gap showed up again in the 17-10 loss to the Cougars, a result that left the Frogs with another frustrating reminder that strong defense alone will not be enough. Dykes has said the defense is playing well, but the bigger question hanging over the program now is how quickly the offense can catch up before these narrow games start slipping away for good. [Read more 🡒]