 "Photo: Kerry Lentz")
Texas Tech freshman kicker Donnie Carona's adjustment period to college football has taken a little too long.
At Monday's press conference, Tech coach Mike Leach said Carona will remain on kickoffs but will no longer kick extra point attempts or short field goals.
Senior kicker Cory Fowler will take over those assignments, something the Red Raiders have done in previous seasons, Leach said.
"I'd rather not split that up," Leach said, "but we used to have the kickoff (and) have the extra point field goal guy so a guy could really zero in on their specific job."
Leach said Fowler most likely would kick field goals 30 yards or less but was unsure if Carona would still try longer attempts.
Carona is 3-for-7 on field goal attempts this year, and 33-for-37 on extra points. He also has missed all three of his attempts from 40 yards or more. Whether its trajectory, protection or confidence issues is a tricky question, considering he has missed his fair share while having several blocked.
When he struggled in the early part of the season, the missed and blocked attempts happened during blowout victories.
It was only a matter of time until Carona would need to make a field goal or a crucial extra point with the game on the line.
Against Nebraska on Saturday, Carona got his chance.
After an Eric Morris touchdown gave Tech a 37-31 lead in overtime, Carona missed the extra point.
"I'm not even gonna talk about that, that's just terrible," center Stephen Hamby said of the play. "No comment on that. That got bad real fast."
Earlier in the fourth quarter, another Carona extra point attempt nearly missed after it clanked off the left upright before going in.
Carona's overtime blunder opened the door for Nebraska to win with a touchdown and an extra point. Fortunately for Carona, cornerback Jamar Wall's game-saving interception on Nebraska's second offensive play of overtime turned the attention away from Carona.
"We're concerned, I thought the kickoffs he did good," Leach said during the post-game press conference. "I thought the extra points, some of them (were) ugly - probably trying to make too much happen. (We) may look at Fowler over there, see how that works out."
Whether Carona missed the extra point or not, Wall said the defense's mindset would be the same even if Carona's kick was good.
"It kind of bothered me, but we still had a chance to go out there and stop them," Wall said. "They still had to score, even if he did miss it. If he would have made just three points, still, our goal is to stop them completely, not letting them score a touchdown."
Morris said he believes extra point attempts should be "pretty automatic most of the time," and he said Carona is just going through a normal phase a lot of young players experience.
"He's a young guy and we need to work really hard right now at keeping him up and not letting him get down on himself," Morris said. "Allowing him to know that we're there for him, and we're supporting him. But he also needs to start making some field goals."
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