Kenny Perry preparing special teams for Oklahoma State
Texas Tech special teams coordinator Kenny Perry used his punter, Jack Burgess, plenty of times on Saturday against Arizona State because the offense was not having much success in the first three quarters of the game. Coy Eakin also had a fair amount of fair catches and punt returns on special teams from the Sun Devils.
Despite a bobble on a fair catch from a punt return and a partially blocked punt, the special teams for the Red Raiders looked solid. Now putting that loss behind them, Tech is focused on Oklahoma State, and Perry spoke to the media on Tuesday to discuss what he sees from Oklahoma State’s special teams and more.
Different returners
This is a point in the season where several injuries can start to pile up. Tech’s starting punt returner, Tristian Gentry, hasn’t played the past three games due to an injury, but is making his way back, while Eakin has taken over that spot. For kickoff returners, J’Koby Williams, Micah Hudson, and even freshman Leyton Stone have gotten some touches back there.
“Just off returner wise, he’s (Stone) a pretty smart kid, done some things. And so we put him back there this last week. Just we’ve been using different guys, you know, like Cam Dickey was back there in the game,” Perry said. “Everyone’s gotta be able to do it. I mean, especially with this day and age of guys getting hurt. So, you know, just like when Tristan (Gentry) got hurt, he was back there one time. So we’ve had to put some depth guys back there. But, yeah, it’s whoever’s back there. They’ve got to help us out there.”
What Perry has seen from Oklahoma State
Even though Oklahoma State is the last-ranked team in the Big 12, it does not affect how the Red Raiders prepare to get back into the win column this week. Despite several things going wrong for the Cowboys this year, Perry praised how well their special teams unit has been.
“Their kickoff team’s been good. Their punt teams got a good punter. Hangs it up, probably going to be hard, you know, if it’s a regular ball that’s hung up in the air, it’s hard to return. You know, I always say a 4.5 second ball on a 45 yard punt, you’re probably not going to return, because they’re going to be down there by the time you catch it,” Perry said. “So you’re looking for the miss hits like we got last week and, you know, or a ball that’s hit, you know, they call it out hitting the coverage. So while it makes you go back, you got time to field it and return it. But, yeah, they do a good job. They’ve done good but, you know, we’ve done really good this year too. So hopefully we get a chance and make a big return with that.”
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