Baylor Football: 3 biggest surprises from Bears’ 2019 season

Baylor football had one of the best seasons of any Big 12 team, earning a trip to Sugar Bowl before losing to Georgia. Who, or what, were the biggest surprises?

If this season wasn’t considered a roller-coaster for Baylor fans, I don’t know what would be. The Bears began the year red-hot and held a huge lead over Oklahoma at home before faltering in the second half and losing their only regular season game to the Sooners.

Baylor met Oklahoma again in the Big 12 title game only to lose for a second time, but still earned a berth in the Sugar Bowl versus Georgia.

This was a chance to earn some national respect and recognition, but the Bulldogs dominated for the most part and handed Baylor its second straight loss in an 11-3 season. Shortly after, the Bears lost their head coach to the NFL and hired a national champion coordinator.

The 2019 season was full of twists and turns and ups and downs but who, or what, were the Bears’ biggest surprises?

3. Terrel Bernard

Coming to Baylor as a lower-rated three-star recruit, Terrel Bernard probably didn’t see himself leading a Sugar Bowl-bound defense in total tackles, but he had a monster season.

The sophomore was an All-Big 12 caliber performer in the middle of the defense, recording a team-high 112 tackles along with 9.5 tackles for loss and 4.5 sacks. He had an interception, two pass deflections and three fumble recoveries and did everything the defenses needed of him, helping to turn the Bears around drastically from 2018 to 2019.

The defense was vastly improved in 2019 and he was one of the main reasons why as a pleasant surprise to the coaching staff and fans.

Sure, he had a solid redshirt freshman year in 2018, but he doubled his production, and then some, in 2019 to surprise some people.

No one could have seen this type of breakout from the first-year full-time starter.