1. Freshman spark

Eleven a.m. kickoffs often involve sluggish starts for fans and football teams, and Saturday was no exception. Luckily, KaVontae Turpin brought enough morning energy for everyone. His dazzling 49-yard first quarter punt return to the end zone lit a fire under the Frogs. When the team came out of the halftime locker room still lagging, quarterback Foster Sawyer, in his first significant game action, amped up the passion and created a buzz felt around the stadium. With the game’s outcome still in question, true freshmen linebacker Ty Summers stole an interception to seal the win. Sometimes senior leaders need to rely on freshman enthusiasm, and the young guys delivered.

2. Reshuffling the deck

Deep balls have been a major nemesis of the 2015 football season, and the coaching staff isn’t finished figuring out how to remedy the issue. Against Kansas, members of the secondary continued to hop around the lineup in a continual effort to slide the healthy players into best-fit positions. With Derrick Kindred and Nick Orr playing well but nursing nagging injuries, the onus fell on guys like cornerback Torrance Mosley and safeties Ridwan Issahaku and Michael Downing. All three stepped up late to stop a determined Kansas in its tracks. Here’s to a repeat performance in Oklahoma next weekend.

3. Hunger of the line

The defensive line is perhaps the only area of the team not to be ravaged by injury this season. Benefitting from a cohesive lineup almost every game, the guys up front have been playing with more fire in each successive week. Seeing athletes, including Aaron Curry and Mike Tuaua, start toward the ball and fight for the stop on every down gives us a lot of hope going into the thicket of the final two regular-season games.

4. Mr. Dependability

With a workmanlike 177 yards on the ground, Aaron Green, passed the 1,000-yard mark for the season. He has now accumulated 2,127 in his TCU career. The afternoon’s yards were good for his career best in the purple and white (or, er, gray lizard camo). Green’s trustworthy play served as a foundation for an afternoon whose fortunes could have blown the other way. This was his eighth career 100-yard game, good for ninth in the record books. While his colleagues on offense have been largely dominating the highlight clips, Green’s dependability has been the backbone of the year’s success.

5. Senior day

Before the season started, if you gave any Frog fan a list of athletes who would miss action due to injury and asked this person to predict the team’s record after 10 games, few would have said 9-1. That the team continues to battle through epic hardship speaks volumes about its senior leadership. Coach Patterson said earlier this week that he moved senior day to the next-to-last home game to give the athletes more time with their visiting families and reduce the already-amped emotion surrounding the Baylor game. Good call. Too bad that Brady Foltz, Ja’Juan Story and Halapoulivaati Vaitai were too injured to play at all, and Trevone Boykin, Josh Doctson and Jamelle Naff are now limited by ailments. If we’ve learned one thing about this senior class, though, it’s that no one and nothing can hold them down.

Running back Aaron Green rushed for a career high 177 yards against Kansas. (Photo by Keith Robinson ’82)

Five stats that stood out

1. Running back/wide receiver Shaun Nixon led TCU in receiving for the second consecutive game with 78 yards on seven catches. His 42-yard reception for a touchdown in the fourth quarter was his first career score.

2. Running back Aaron Green had a career-high 177 yards on 30 carries. It was the highest rushing total for the Horned Frogs since Waymon James’ 181 in 2011 at Wyoming. For Green, it was the fourth time this season he’s gone over 100 yards on the ground and the eighth time in his career. Only eight Frogs have more 100-yard career rushing games. Green also has 2,127 rushing yards for his career and is the Frogs’ active rushing leader, passing Trevone Boykin. With 973 rushing yards this season, Green has bested his 922 total a year ago and is on pace to become the program’s first 1,000-yard rusher since Ed Wesley in 2010. If Green gets 135 more yards on the ground over the remaining three games, he’ll have the most rushing yards in a season since LaDainian Tomlinson’s 2,158 in 2000.

3. Place kicker Jaden Oberkrom booted field goals of 42, 38 and 36 yards to raise his career total to 74. It’s already a TCU record, but it’s now one behind Oklahoma’s Michael Hunnicutt (2011-14) as the all-time Big 12 Conference leader.

4. The TCU defense recorded three sacks against Kansas, extending their streak of at least one in 27 consecutive games. It breaks a school record of 26 that was set from 2007-09. It is the fourth-longest active streak in the NCAA. The defense also held an opponent to three first downs or less in the second half for the second straight game. Kansas had just three first downs and 102 yards after halftime, while Oklahoma State totaled two first downs and 122 yards a week ago.

5. The senior class upped its record to 32-16 in its career at TCU. The class has won a share of the Big 12 title and a Peach Bowl victory. At home, the class is 22-8, including a 12-game winning streak. The group is 5-2 against ranked foes.

Backup quarterback Foster Sawyer provided a spark for the TCU offense in the second half. (Photo by Keith Robinson ’82)

Five tweets that told the tale

It wasn’t pretty, it wasn’t neat, and injuries continue to plague the Frogs, but it was a WIN. #TCU now 9-1 on the season #GoFrogs

— Killer Frogs (@Killer_Frogs) November 14, 2015

Extremely emotional day for me. The love that I have for my teammates and my University is unexplainable… 9-1 #ForEverTCU — Aaron Green (@AaronGreen22) November 15, 2015

Love the attitude from @foster_sawyer of @TCUFootball #GoFrogs #BeatKU

— TheFrogHorn (@TheFrogHorn) November 14, 2015

Who wins the Big 12? All the possible outcomes here, assuming Baylor defeats Texas pic.twitter.com/XMtN6VkbX5 — Max Olson (@max_olson) November 16, 2015

If you think there is any ‘quit’ in these frogs, you haven’t been paying attention. #FrogFactor pic.twitter.com/YL7B3VX8np

— K.Patterson (@kels_patterson) November 14, 2015