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Texas Tech 63, Kansas 21. If this was going to be Texas Tech's breakthrough season, the Raiders had to overcome one glaring number: .375. That was Tech's road winning percentage in Big 12 games under Mike Leach coming into this year, almost the complete opposite of its stellar conference record in Lubbock (23-9). And if there was any place that trend would show up after a long string of cupcakes and bottom dwellers, it would be Lawrence, where Kansas wins about three times as often under Mark Mangino as on the road, and where the Jayhawks ran up one of the longest home winning streaks in the country, back to mid-2006. This is the random road game even good Raider teams regularly lost -- at Oklahoma State in 2005, at Colorado in '06, at Missouri and Oklahoma State again last year. There's a reason KU came in a slight favorite.

So I'd say blowing Kansas out of the stadium was even better for the big picture than the gaudy final score suggests. You'll continue to hear about the offense and the "nine touchdowns in ten possessions" thing, but you already knew that. What was different about this win was the Raider defense, which justified the dubious preseason hype against by far the best offense it's faced to this point. While the first quarter looked like the start of a certain, back-and-forth race from one end of the field to the other Kansas' possessions in the second and third quarters went like this:

That's a pretty good offense held to 15 plays, 19 yards, one first down and three turnovers over two full quarters, while Tech's offense did what it does: score, and score, and score. If the Raiders make their move next week against Texas, the same defense has to show up again.