FORT WORTH, Texas -- — Josh Hoover threw for 337 yards and four touchdowns, two to freshman Ed Small, and TCU beat Football Championship Subdivision member Abilene Christian 42-21 on Saturday night.

Joseph Manjack IV had 114 yards receiving for the Horned Frogs (2-0), who played their home opener almost two weeks after a 48-14 romp at North Carolina in coach Bill Belichick's ballyhooed debut with the Tar Heels.

Stone Earle threw for 276 yards and two touchdowns for the Wildcats (1-2), who had a much better offensive showing in their second meeting with an FBS opponent this season. ACU fell to 1-19 against FBS teams.

Small's first career TD was a one-armed grab near the back of the end zone for a 14-0 lead, and he finished off the first-half scoring with a 15-yard catch for a 28-0 lead. Small had six catches for 45 yards.

“Thought we played a pretty clean first half,” TCU coach Sonny Dykes said after his 100th career victory. “Second half, their quarterback got hot and we didn’t play well. We didn’t do a good job the entire night defensively of getting off the field.”

Hoover was 21 of 27 without an interception, and his other scoring tosses were 11 yards to Chase Curtis and 21 yards to Jordan Dwyer, who had five catches for 89 yards.

The takeaways

ACU: The Wildcats will head into United Athletic Conference play feeling good about their offense. They had six consecutive drives of at least eight plays, scoring on the last four. ACU had 452 total yards after the Horned Frogs held Belichick's Tar Heels to 222 in the opener.

“You’re comparing an apple to an orange when you’re playing a team from the Big 12,” coach Keith Patterson said. “It’s two different sets of circumstances. All I care is to see us get better. I’m going to say we got better tonight.”

TCU: The Horned Frogs scored on all six full possessions led by Hoover, who was 9 of 10 on third down. TCU didn't punt until late in the fourth quarter and had 489 yards.

Sonny's century mark

Dykes, the son of the late Texas Tech coach Spike Dykes, got win No. 100 in his 176th game. He had stops at Louisiana Tech, California and SMU before joining the Horned Frogs, who played for the national championship in his first season in 2022. TCU was blown out by Georgia.

“None of them are easy. That’s the one thing you learn," Dykes said. “Hard to hang around long enough, I guess, to get to 100. But that’s a credit to the players. It’s neat, but I hadn’t really thought about it too much.”

What about those 2 points?

The outcome was no longer in doubt when TCU coaches, players and fans thought they had two points taken away on a 2-point conversion attempt by ACU in the fourth quarter.

Officials ruled that Rovaughn Banks had crossed the goal line before the ball came out and was scooped up by Bud Clark, who returned it 101 yards for what TCU thought would be two points.

Replay showed the ball coming out before Banks was in the end zone, so ACU's conversion was overturned. Since the ruling on the field was a successful conversion, anything that happened afterward was nullified. But that didn't stop the TCU contingent from wondering what happened to those two points.

Up next

ACU: Austin Peay at home in the conference opener next Saturday.

TCU: SMU at home next Saturday in the last currently scheduled meeting for Dallas-Fort Worth's Iron Skillet rivalry.

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