By Jackson Posey | Sports Editor
Clouds parted over McLane Stadium on Saturday afternoon, sending rays of sunshine onto a furious comeback attempt. Postseason eligibility hung in the balance.
But while the sun broke through, the Bears fell short in the red zone one too many times. Baylor lost to Houston, 31-24, falling to 5-7 on the season and sealing the team’s third losing season in four years.
“Frustrated, sad with the outcome this morning,” head coach Dave Aranda said. “I really wanted to win for our seniors, a win for the extended Baylor [football] family … to have a day in the sun, and it’s been too long since that was the case.”
Baylor (5-7, 3-6 Big 12) hasn’t won a bowl game since the 2021 season, when it won a program-record 12 games and its first Big 12 Championship game. This year ended as it began back in Week 1: with a chrome-plated defense unable to stop the quarterback run. Houston (9-3, 6-3 Big 12) signal-caller Conner Weigman scooted for a career-high 121 yards and two scores in the Cougar victory.
“We try to play to the best of our ability — whatever the call is, we got to execute it,” said redshirt sophomore Keaton Thomas. He led the team in tackles (11) and tackles for loss (2) and posted the Bears’ lone sack and interception. “Sometimes it just goes like that, but we got to execute better.”
Baylor’s running back room entered Saturday’s game shorthanded, with freshman Michael Turner ruled out and redshirt sophomore Bryson Washington exiting the first drive with a lower-body injury.
The team suffered another blow in the third quarter, when freshman tailback Caden Knighten took a hard hit at the line of scrimmage and was rendered motionless, lying face down on the ground. He remained there for over five minutes, surrounded by more than a dozen trainers, coaches and staffers, before eventually being carted off to an ambulance. While being stretchered to the cart, he lifted his fist toward the air.
Aranda confirmed after the game that Knighten has movement in his extremities and that the hospital visit was “precautionary,” but tests are still underway.
“It’s way scary,” Aranda said. “I know that was heavy on guys’ hearts after that.”
Houston tore through the defense to open the game. Weigman, a Texas A&M transfer, passed for 57 yards and ran for another 10, slicing through an injured secondary. Amare Thomas (97 yards, 1 TD) caught the sealer, a 27-yard crosser up the left sideline.
Baylor quarterback Sawyer Robertson cried jinx, passing for 51 yards and rushing for 10 on the following drive, but the Bears couldn’t finish the deed. The redshirt senior rocketed a pass to sixth-year wide receiver Ashtyn Hawkins across the middle, but it ricocheted off a linebacker and soared skyward. Houston’s Marc Stampley II caught the pop fly in the end zone to flip the field.
Cougar linebacker Brandon Mack broke through the offensive line on the following drive, jarring the ball free from Robertson’s grasp. It was Baylor’s seventh turnover in its past 11 offensive drives, stretching back to last week’s game against Arizona. The Bears did not score in that 11-drive span.
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Houston did score, courtesy of another Weigman scamper, as Baylor began building momentum. Redshirt freshman kicker Connor Hawkins broke the scoreless streak with a career-long 54-yard field goal and Thomas stopped the bleeding defensively with his first interception of the season.
A holding penalty nullified a Robertson touchdown run, setting up the first of three back-and-forth field goals. The Bears reached the red zone six times on Saturday, yet left with only a single touchdown and a pair of field goals. They hit the locker room with a 17-9 halftime deficit.
“Kind of par for the course this season,” Robertson said of the loss. “Just being in the fight and kind of swimming upstream.”
Weigman stretched the lead to two scores, turning a quarterback keeper into his second touchdown run of the game. The Cougars’ signal-caller turned in a stellar performance, racking up 322 total yards and three touchdowns on 21-of-31 passing.
Knighten’s injury stopped play for over 10 minutes, as players from both teams stood silently on the turf. Several Houston players knelt, and Aranda led the Bears in a prayer. Baylor’s drive ended two plays later, on a fourth-and-3 from the Houston 12-yard line.
The next time around, they were ready. The Bears called on fourth-string running back Joseph Dodds, a redshirt freshman who missed last season with an injury and almost missed Saturday’s game after what Aranda called a “personal tragedy” in the morning.
“We were consoling him prior to [the game], didn’t know if he was even going to play,” Aranda said. “He’s playing through it, just inspired to try to represent.”
Offensive coordinator Jake Spavital called Dodds’ number five times that drive, and he came through, rewarding the staff’s trust with 17 yards and a touchdown — the team’s first in seven quarters. Robertson scrambled up the middle on the 2-point conversion, crossing the plane to cut the lead to 24-17.
“When [Knighten] went down, I think guys kind of rallied around it, for sure,” Robertson said.
The Bears forced a turnover on downs at midfield, setting up a potential game-tying drive. They rose to the occasion. Three plays after Josh Cameron failed to haul in a potential first down, the redshirt senior streaked down the right sideline and past his defender. The pass dropped into his outstretched hands like manna from heaven. Tie ballgame.
Houston bullied its way back into the end zone, setting up the biggest two minutes of Baylor’s season. Big-play threat Kobe Prentice pirouetted into a 48-yard catch past two defenders, then took a drag route into the red zone.
Ashtyn Hawkins nearly hauled in his first touchdown of the season, but a Cougar defender stiff-armed his helmet off in midair. The buzzing crowd got angrier when, on third down, a defensive back slid over sophomore Jadon Porter on another incompletion.
That set up fourth-and-10 from the 13-yard line, with the postseason on the line.
Robertson strained for a receiver, but the options were blanketed. He spun around to avoid a would-be tackler and, with a lineman draped over him, managed to release the ball before taking a sack. It fell harmlessly to the turf.
Four straight incompletions ended the season.
“Driving on them and getting down to the red zone, really just got to capitalize,” Cameron said. “You got to find a way to get in there.”
The loss punctuated the third losing season in the past four years under Aranda, who has faced public pressure from fans. The university announced on Nov. 21 that he will return in 2026 following the resignation of Athletic Director Mack Rhoades. The Bears are 13-12 over the past two seasons.
“Even though Josh [Cameron] and I aren’t the ones that are going to be celebrating any kind of conference championships or playoff berths, hopefully we can look back one day and say that we played a role into laying the foundation when everything changed in 2023,” Robertson said.
