Changing the Game: The Ridiculousness of Trevone Boykin

Trevone Boykin was not playing college football Thursday night. Everyone else may have been, but the senior quarterback wasn't.

Whatever sport he was playing, no one else knew the rules. No one knew you were allowed to dance through a defense like that. No one knew you could spin out of the hands of defenders and turn sure sacks into 20-yard completions. But Boykin had changed the game.

TCU is 8-0 after a 40-10 win over West Virginia, thanks in large part to the play of Boykin, who is mounting a Heisman campaign as a senior. Boykin finished the night with 472 yards of total offense and four total touchdowns, three passing and one rushing, with no turnovers as the Horned Frogs cruised to victory.

Boykin now has 34 total touchdowns on the year and 3,451 total yards. It's different from the last time the Horned Frogs played the Mountaineers in Fort Worth. He was playing wide receiver then. Some thought he should stay there.

"Especially if you think about what his resume his freshman and sophomore year was like," TCU head coach Gary Patterson said, "and how many critics he had, how many people said he couldn't do it … if you look at the whole road, you go, 'Wow. How did this happen?'"

The Mountaineers were left asking the same question as they watched Boykin evade tacklers and toss touchdowns with ease. On the Frogs' second trip into the red zone, Boykin ran left on a designed quarterback run. He had one Mountaineer pursuing from behind as he tried to get to the edge.

WVU defensive back Daryl Worley left his man and went to tackle the quarterback. He had the play read. He could make the tackle at the 1-yard line and force the Frogs to go back and try another play.

Then Boykin, without breaking stride, hopped over Worley and somersaulted into the end zone. The play was almost more remarkable because of the ease with which Boykin made it happen. It almost seemed routine, in part because it was actually the third forward-flipping score of his career.

Making such plays look easy is why WVU head coach Dana Holgorsen called him the best player in college football.

"He's a phenomenal player," Holgorsen said. "I'm glad we don't have to play him anymore."

Sometimes, when a player has that kind of game, all an opposing coach can do is give him credit.