The football fortunes for TCU and Baylor have been drastically different since going their separate ways. The gap was evident in one of their rare games since the end of the Southwest Conference.
Ed Wesley ran 19 times for 165 yards and two touchdowns, Andy Dalton completed 21 of 23 passes for 267 yards with two scores and fourth-ranked TCU stretched its home winning streak to 16 games with a 45-10 victory over the Bears on Saturday.
The Horned Frogs (3-0) scored touchdowns on their first five drives to build a 35-3 lead and had 335 of their 558 total yards by halftime.
Dalton, whose 91-percent completion rate was a single-game TCU record, hit his first 11 passes on way to his 32nd career victory, most among active BCS quarterbacks. His first incompletion didn't come until 4 minutes into the second quarter.
After overthrowing a covered receiver in the end zone, Dalton hit Jimmy Young for an 11-yard pass to the Baylor 12 on the next play. Wesley needed two runs from there to score, his 5-yarder for his second touchdown capping an 11-play, 90-yard drive for a 28-3 lead.
Baylor (2-1) missed a chance for only its second 3-0 start since 1996. The Bears haven't had a winning season since the inception of the Big 12 in 1996 and are 2-48 against ranked teams during that span -- 0-19 vs. top-five teams.
This was only the third meeting between the private Christian schools less than 90 miles apart since 1995, the last season of the SWC. BCS-busting TCU has won the three games by a combined score of 89-17, and now has a 50-49-7 series lead.
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The Frogs have won or shared conference titles in three different leagues since being left out when Baylor and three other Texas schools from the old SWC merged with the Big Eight to form the Big 12. Even without automatic access into the Bowl Championship Series like those other schools, TCU reached the BCS last year after an undefeated regular season.
On the opening series of the game, Dalton hit a wide-open Jeremy Kerley streaking down the middle of the field for a 28-yard score.
After Baylor dual-threat quarterback Robert Griffin was stuffed for a 5-yard loss on his first snap and the Bears went three-and-out, Wesley took a handoff over the left side, busted through the line and had a clear path to the end zone for a 14-0 lead less than 7½ minutes into the game.
Griffin threw a 53-yard TD pass to Josh Gordon in the third quarter, but was frustrated most of the day by TCU's stifling defense. Griffin finished 16-of-28 passing for 164 yard and ran 14 times for only 21 yards.
The 11 consecutive completions to start the game were a career high for Dalton, and the second-best in TCU history.
Kerley had six catches for 69 yards, plus had a 45-yard punt return in the second quarter that set TCU up at the Baylor 25 before Luke Shivers scored on a 2-yard run to make it 35-3. Kerley broke free toward the left sideline after Greg Burks' crushing block on Mike Hicks, who was flattened when it appeared he might be able to get to Kerley.
