KU football stuns TCU with help from Pooka magic

David Beaty needed this.

After keeping it competitive with TCU in two of his three years as Kansas coach, Beaty oversaw a breakthrough Saturday, with the Jayhawks completing a fourth-quarter comeback for a 27-26 victory over the Horned Frogs.

The win should give Beaty a chance to breathe a bit. The Jayhawks, who had lost four straight coming in, improved to 3-5 while potentially extending Beaty’s coaching timeline at least until the end of the season.

“Those guys deserve to have success,” Beaty said of his players. “I think the challenge for us moving forward is to make sure that we don’t make this something that we’re just surprised at — that we continue to move forward.”

Saturday’s biggest offensive moment came from KU’s most dynamic playmaker.

With KU trailing late in the fourth quarter, true freshman running back Pooka Williams — affectionately called “Pooka Magic” — took a swing pass, made two defenders miss with sharp cuts to the inside, then stretched the ball over the goal line for a 28-yard score. Williams fumbled the ball right around the goal line, but after review, the touchdown call stood as KU took a 27-24 lead.

TCU had a chance to retake the lead on the ensuing possession, but TCU’s Darius Anderson fumbled inside the 10 on a run with no defender contact. KU’s KeyShaun Simmons recovered, and after a review, the football was given to KU with 1:11 left.

Shortly after, on social media, it was already being labeled as a “butt fumble,” with replays showing that Anderson had lost the ball after bouncing into left guard Austin Myers’ backside.

“Football’s a game of breaks, man,” KU linebacker Joe Dineen said. “You make your own luck, and then every once in a while, the ball will hit and flip one way.”

The Jayhawks picked up one first down to help ice it before an intentional safety left one second on the clock with KU leading by one. That’s when things became interesting again.

Liam Jones squibbed KU’s free kick from the 20, which reached TCU’s La’Kendrick VanZandt at the 33. He tried to run the ball back, which eliminated the final second off the clock.

TCU coach Gary Patterson said that wasn’t what VanZandt was instructed to do.

“Everybody was told ‘fall on the ball.’ Then the clock doesn’t start. And then you’ve got a chance to kick a field goal,” Patterson said. “Everybody was told to ‘fall on the ball.’ It’s what I told them in the locker room. Everybody was told ‘fall on the ball.’ If you fall on the ball you’ve got one second. On the sideline, everybody was told ‘fall on the ball.’ A redshirt freshman caught it. Everybody was told ‘fall on the ball.’ Let me repeat that again: Everybody was told ‘fall on the ball.’”

Beaty was asked if he believed TCU would have had time left to kick a potential game-winning field goal if it had simply fallen on the kickoff.

“I don’t know. That’s a good question,” Beaty said. “I will say this: We were fortunate, because we weren’t trying to kick it to the front line. We were trying to get it through. It didn’t get through, and our guys reacted well. I was proud of them. We weren’t necessarily trying to onside there.”

Beaty picked up his second Big 12 victory and first since defeating Texas, 24-21, in 2016. As a result, KU reached three wins in a season for the first time since 2014.

Only 15,069 fans attended the game in near-perfect weather conditions, but dozens of KU students still made their way to the field for the postgame celebration, leaving the goalposts upright with two levels of security keeping them away from the north end zone.

The Jayhawks will play host to Iowa State at 11 a.m. on Nov. 3.

Jesse Newell

Jesse Newell covers University of Kansas athletics for The Star.

This story was originally published October 27, 2018 at 5:44 PM.