TEMPE, Ariz. -- On the first play of the fourth quarter Saturday, Patrick Mahomes II, the most prolific passer in college football, faced his biggest moment of the young season.

Third-and-7 from the Texas Tech 28. The Red Raiders' were facing a 10-point deficit against Arizona State. If the junior quarterback Mahomes were to show the results of his progression over the previous nine months after he quit baseball to focus on his future, this was likely his time.

Patrick Mahomes II threw for 540 yards in the loss to Arizona State. Christian Petersen/Getty Images

Mahomes showed patience out of the quarter break. With the game clock stopped, he barked an audible and motioned for movement from multiple receivers. Then the snap, and Mahomes backpedaled, changing directions. His footwork fell out of rhythm.

He felt pressure and heaved the ball deep to his left, far past receiver Derrick Willies. Mahomes' next throw on the ensuing possession was intercepted, his first pick of the season.

"He was trying to make the 21-point pass," Tech coach Kliff Kingsbury said. "It doesn't exist."

The Sun Devils' Kalen Ballage scored his seventh touchdown of the game four seconds later. With that, it was essentially over, and Mahomes stood right where he started this season: as a monster of a QB talent, perhaps the most gifted player in the Big 12, but apparently without a supporting cast to support his championship aspirations.

This is the conundrum for the Red Raiders and Mahomes, unique because of his athleticism and diverse skills compared to the Tech quarterbacks who preceded him but unable yet to break through in red-letter games. Mahomes is 0-6 against ranked opponents and 9-10 as a starter. Since his second career start as a true freshman in November 2014 -- after he left with a head injury two weeks prior in a loss to Texas -- Mahomes ranks No. 1 nationally with 6,995 passing yards and second with 59 touchdown passes.

Over that time, defensively, Texas Tech has allowed 543 yards per game (worst in the FBS), 42.9 points per game and a whopping 50.2 percent third-down completion rate. Three times in its past 12 games, Tech has scored 50 points and lost. On Saturday in Tempe, from midway through the first quarter until nine minutes remained in its 68-55 win, ASU scored touchdowns on eight of nine drives and faced just nine third downs, of which it converted eight.

"They had a bad game, but I think you'll see a lot of improvement," Mahomes said of the Tech defense after its first road test of 2016. "We have all the faith in them. We know that they're going to make the big stops."

Doubt Mahomes at your own risk, but it isn't always the best idea.

Mahomes considered quitting the sport before his junior year of high school in Whitehouse, Texas. So said his mom, Randi Mahomes, and dad, Pat Mahomes, a former major league relief pitcher who played 11 seasons with six teams.

Both parents were on board. Randi, with whom Patrick lived after his parents divorced more than a decade ago, has always struggled to watch him play football, she said. Pat wondered why his son, so distinguished in other sports, wanted to compete for the quarterback position.

"Why are you messing around?" Pat said at Sun Devil Stadium before the game, in recalling his 2012 conversation with Patrick. "You're special in basketball. You're special in baseball. Why are you playing this other sport? For what reason?"

Father and son went to the University of Texas for a camp, Pat said. The coaches liked Patrick as a safety.

"He said, 'Dad, I can play quarterback,'" Pat said. "I said, 'I know you can play quarterback, son, but nobody else thinks you can.'"

Patrick said he mulled the decision to quit the game but never took it to his coaches or friends.

"I had the potential to be a high draft pick in baseball," said the younger Mahomes, a promising right-handed pitcher in the mold of his father. "I had to decide if I really wanted to play football or try to get drafted in the first or second round."

Ultimately, Patrick won the job at Whitehouse in the fall of 2012 and committed to Texas Tech in April 2013. In the 2013-14 offseason, incumbent starter Baker Mayfield left Tech for Oklahoma, and Michael Brewer transferred to Virginia Tech. That left the Red Raiders with Davis Webb as a sophomore and Mahomes behind him.

Again, the elder Mahomes said he questioned his son, suggesting he might have to sit for two or three years. But Patrick proved him wrong. He replaced an ailing Webb late in 2014. In Mahomes' fourth start, he threw for 598 yards and six touchdowns in a 48-46 loss to Baylor. Last year, he won the job late in camp over Webb, who transferred to Cal.

In that freshman season, even as he prepared to play baseball at Tech in the spring of 2015, Mahomes said, he fell hard for football.

"I love how hard it is to be good," he said. "I love being challenged. I love the drive it takes to succeed and having the ball in my hands with the chance to win games."

Since that discovery, Mahomes' leadership has not wavered.

"It's his team," Tech receiver Dylan Cantrell said. "It's his offense. Everybody knows that."

Mahomes' 4,653 passing yards as a sophomore ranked fourth nationally. He leads the nation as the lone quarterback to top 1,000 yards through two games this year, after he threw for 540 and five touchdowns Saturday at ASU.

He would trade all the stats for more wins.

"I want to be that first quarterback to bring back a Big 12 championship to this university," Mahomes said. "They bleed Texas Tech football here, and they really do want a championship. All their quarterbacks have had a lot of stats, but they haven't got that."

In three of its last 12 games, Tech has scored 50-plus points and lost. Christian Petersen/Getty Images

Patrick told his dad before the season that he would lead Tech to the Big 12 title this year, the elder Mahomes said. Doubt him?

"I don't doubt anything he says anymore," Pat Mahomes said. "Anything he's ever told me, he's done. So I'm all in. I believe he's going to win the Big 12."

In his first two years at Tech, teammates had a nickname for Mahomes: Fatrick.

Cantrell laughed at it this week. He has known Mahomes since they were kids playing baseball on the same teams in Whitehouse.

Mahomes added 15 to 20 pounds this year and redistributed additional weight. When he took the field Saturday at Sun Devil Stadium, listed at 6-foot-3 and 230 pounds, Mahomes looked more linebacker than quarterback. His improved shape coincided with his decision early in 2016 to leave the Tech baseball team after just one season.

Patrick struggled with the new reality as the Red Raiders advanced to the College World Series in June.

"I know it wasn't an easy decision," Cantrell said. "Baseball was his first love. But he's going to do whatever he has to do to win."

It starts, Mahomes said, with eliminating those ill-advised throws that resurfaced in the fourth quarter at Arizona State. Mahomes threw 15 interceptions last year. He's always going to improvise on a few plays because of his athleticism, Cantrell said. But after Tech's first loss this season, the QB is more intent than ever on making the smart play every time he touches the ball.

"It's easier said than done, but I can learn from my mistakes," Mahomes said. "Really, it's just staying with my reads and progressions. It's something I have to get better at every week. Whether we're scoring or they're scoring, I have to take what [the defense is] giving me."

According to Kingsbury, Mahomes has already taken big strides this year. Despite the loss last week, in which Mahomes' first interception led to a decisive, short-field touchdown for ASU, the fourth-year coach said he expects to see more progress immediately.

For the most part, Mahomes has tightened his mechanics. Plus, the chance to work on football year-round for the first time is no small item.

"I think that's huge," Kingsbury said.

The Red Raiders host Louisiana Tech on Saturday, then open the Big 12 with Kansas, Kansas State and West Virginia before Oklahoma visits Lubbock on Oct. 22.

Will Mahomes be ready to take the next step before Tech's challenging finish, which features TCU, Texas and Oklahoma State after the Sooners? More pressing, will his supporting cast stand a chance to let him run the offense without the need for perfection?

"If [the defense] can make one or two stops in the right situation, we're going to win the game," Mahomes said. "We can score any moment."

Scoring has never been the problem. But with the Big 12 race seemingly never more wide-open than it is this season, the Red Raiders can get more from Mahomes in 2016 if he tries to do less.