Five Big Questions — Is A&M a second-half team now? Is it time to worry about Houston?

Is it time to worry about Houston? We now have four games worth of sample by which to judge Houston, and how many would you say the Coogs were truly impressive? One? (The win over Rice — the victory at Arizona is nice, but frankly, expectations have been raised to a point where it’s to be expected.) But the Cougars followed up their disappointing loss to Texas Tech with a lackluster victory over a woeful Temple squad, and the same problems continued to plague Houston — a come-and-go offense and too many penalties. The Cougars made the move to Kyle Postma at quarterback, and things were a little better — he threw for 226 yards, a touchdown and an interception while also leading the team with 81 yards rushing — but this is still far from the attack that we expected at the beginning of the year. The Cougars are 3-1 largely on the back of their defense, but they can’t do all the heavy lifting, especially if defensive lineman Ed Oliver is out for any significant period of time. Style points ultimately don’t matter, and a road conference win is a road conference win, but there is reason to worry about the Cougars meeting the high expectations their recent history has set for them. Is Texas A&M morphing into a second-half team? It sounds silly to say, considering their one loss this season was as epic a second-half collapse as you may ever see. But since then, the Aggies have been decidedly better in the third and fourth quarter than the second and first. Once again, A&M trailed at halftime against South Carolina after more-or-less sleepwalking through the first half; and once again, they found their groove in the second half and pulled out a victory. This is a trend — it happened against Arkansas, as the Aggies trailed 21-17 at half; it happened against Louisiana-Lafayette, as the Aggies trailed 21-14 at half; and while they didn’t trail at half against Nicholls State, they were emphatically better in the final two quarters against the Colonels. Falling behind and relying on a comeback is no way to live — especially with Alabama looming — but maybe we should start giving the Aggie coaching staff credit for halftime adjustments, considering they seems to be paying off every week. Does anything change about Texas Tech’s outlook? Losing is no fun, but Texas Tech once again showed that they’re a clearly improved squad over last year’s bunch in the loss to Oklahoma State. The numbers are ugly, but we knew they were going to be ugly. Oklahoma State rang up 597 yards of total offense on Texas Tech, including 376 yards and three scores through the air from quarterback Mason Rudolph. Instead, Tech’s is winning along the margin. They’re forcing turnovers, like DaMarcus Fields’ 95-yard interception return for a touchdown. They’re making opponents work harder for their yards — last year, Oklahoma State rang up 605 yards on 66 plays against Tech (9.1 yards per play); this year it was 597 yards, but it took 82 plays to get it (7.1 yards per play). The offense isn’t as much of a flamethrower, but it also doesn’t have to be. In many respects, while 3-1 is worse than 4-0, the outlook remains the same for Texas Tech. How many coaching changes are we going to see before next season? This goes deeper than “is A&M going to fire Kevin Sumlin.” Suddenly, a number of college coaches in Texas are becoming hot prospects for other jobs. As LSU lost to Troy, one couldn’t help but think about Ed Orgeron’s long-term viability in Baton Rouge, and how well UTSA coach and former LSU assistant Frank Wilson would fit there. As North Texas pulled off a doubly-impressive road win over Southern Miss, you start to think about how many programs would love to have an offensive guru like Seth Littrell. The same questions remain —Sumlin is far from secure in College Station, and Rice and UTEP’s losses don’t improve the viability of David Bailiff and Sean Kugler, respectively — but when you take a step back, you realize the job market in Texas may be even more expansive. Exactly how many teams in Texas have a quarterback they are committed to? UTEP’s QB situation is a mess. Rice can’t land on anyone. Texas keeps bouncing between Buechele and Ehlinger (and it’ll get murkier with Buechele’s ankle injury). Baylor inexplicably burned Charlie Brewer’s redshirt for two plays today. Houston’s already benched their opening day starter. That’s a lot of signal-caller turnover, and we’re only five weeks in.