The Morning Stake: February 2nd

Miscellaneous

Report: Big 12 to Discuss Expansion. SportingNews’ Matt Hayes reports that the Big 12 is set to discuss expansion this week:

1. The Big 12 could choose to move east to add Cincinnati and Connecticut. Cincinnati has developed the most consistent football program of potential expansion candidates and is located in a major media market. UConn is four-time NCAA champion in men’s basketball and also adds the cachet of the dynastic women’s basketball program.

2. For football recruiting purposes and long-term potential, the Big 12 could advance into Florida by adding Central Florida and South Florida.

3. The Big 12 could decide not to expand at all.

ESPN’s Jake Trotter writes that this is an incredibly important 3 months for the Big 12:

Boren understands that Oklahoma has leverage the other Big 12 schools don’t. If the Big 12 ever dissolved, the Sooners have the tradition and the following that would assuredly land them a spot in another Power 5 conference. That wouldn’t necessarily be the case for the rest of the Big 12. Texas, of course, would have a landing spot, too. But the Longhorns most likely wouldn’t be able to take the Longhorn Network with them to the Pac-12, Big Ten or SEC, which already have conference networks in place.

That is leverage Boren clearly won’t be afraid to use to push his agenda.

What is unclear is how the Texas brass will react.

DeLoss Dodds and Bill Powers, who played hardball with Oklahoma and the rest of the Big 12, are no longer around. Instead, the Longhorns have a new president in Gregory Fenves and a new athletic director in Mike Perrin.

Would they be open to compromising with Boren and whatever supporting contingent he is able to cobble together?

Tennis

Red Raider Scholar Athlete of the Month: Sabrina Federici. Congrats to Sabrinia for being named the Red Raider Club Scholar Athlete of the Month!

Lady Raiders Basketball

Texas Tech to Take on West Virginia. The Lady Raiders will host West Virginia, tonight at 6:00 pm, the game airing on FOX Sports 2. Texas Tech won their first conference game against Kansas on Saturday. Here is head coach Candi Whitaker on WVU:

“West Virginia is good. I think they are a top-three team in this league as far as their ability to make plays and make it difficult for you to run offense,” Texas Tech head coach Candi Whitaker said. “They have great athletes, they can shoot it well–they are much improved in that area from last year–and some of their best scorers come off the bench. They have a lot of bullets in their gun, and they are going to play with high energy. We are going to have to use their pressure against them, find ways to counter and get to the line.”

LAJ’s Nicholas Talbot has a short preview of the game.

Baseball

Men’s Basketball

Damaged Psyche. LAJ’s Krista Pirtle writes that head coach Tubby Smith believes that Texas Tech’s “mental psyche is damaged” and needs to respond in the proper way:

“We need to execute better,” Smith said. “In league play it’s been a real problem for us turning the ball over, although we’re still better than we were last year. … We haven’t defended well. That’s the most important thing. We have to do a better job defensively.”

Football

Negative Recruiting. Via ESPN, this is just terrific:

Coach X said the best negative recruiters strike a balance between talking about the positives of their program and trying to stay honest, while at the same time finding creative ways to put down their recruiting rivals.

“It’s not easy,” he said. “The art of negative recruiting is trying to be a real person and pointing out the negatives about the other teams without attacking an individual coach. You want to be genuine as much as possible without getting personal. Talking about certain aspects about another program is considered fair play by most, but it crosses the line when it gets personal and coaches start talking about a coach’s life away from football.”

Miscellaneous. RRS’s Will McKay has some NSD storylines and we all hope it is the most boring NSD ever . . . DMN’s Mike DuPont looks at the 2015 class and how they performed on the field in 2015

Recruiting Updates.

https://twitter.com/GoSouthmooreFB/status/694224332847853568

https://twitter.com/jordynbrooks25/status/694164523259834368

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