Soccer

 The soccer team hasn’t had a ton of road games thus far, but they did hit the road and defeated Appalachain State in North Carolina yesterday afternoon.

No. 22 #TexasTech Posts 2-1 Comeback Win At App. State Sunday – https://t.co/AihhktAijr #WreckEm pic.twitter.com/KgnQNrLtV9

— Texas Tech Soccer (@TexasTechSoccer) September 11, 2016

Volleyball

The volleyball team won all four games in their invitational this weekend.

Recap | Red Raiders Capture Texas Tech Invitational Crown, Douglass Named MVPhttps://t.co/zghthkdtoo #WreckEm pic.twitter.com/eyV4mTWwD5

— TexasTech Volleyball (@TTUVball) September 11, 2016

Football

Ed. Note: After the game, I stayed up until about 3:00 writing the 10 things, then grabbed about 3 hours of sleep and as of this morning, I’m still tired. I think I’m officially too old for Pac-12 games. This also means that I wasn’t really looking for news and links yesterday as I tried to give myself a day off on Sunday.

LAJ’s Don Williams asks a question a lot of you have been asking, “What progress?” after giving up 68 points to Arizona State, is this team actually making progress. For the record, Kingsbury said it wasn’t reflective on Saturday night, but yes, the team is getting better.

“We’re better than what we showed,” Kingsbury said. “That was a good team that beat us and you’ve got to give them a lot of credit. They outcoached us, outplayed us, but we’re better than we played tonight, so we need to show that next week.”

The Tech defense forced three punts on its first four series. Here’s what Arizona State got on its last 12 possessions: eight touchdowns, a field goal, end of the first half, end of the game and only one punt.

What does that say about the strength and conditioning program that’s been talked up so?

Ballage’s showing aside, quarterback Manny Wilkins went 28 for 37 for 351 yards. That from a sophomore in his second career start, being pressured not much at all behind an offensive line with one returning starter. What does that say about the Tech defensive line that rung up five sacks in the opener?

LAJ’s Don Williams also writes that giving up 68 points to Arizona State isn’t even surprising any more. Williams does confirm that assistant coaches are not allowed to do interiews any more, which is what I thought on Sunday morning when writing the 10 things.

So much for whatever presumptions Tech fans made since last season: The one about it being a good thing they lost all those seniors from the front seven so that a new attitude could take over. The one about how shutting down Stephen F. Austin, a 4-7 FCS team a year ago, ushered in a new era of tough, physical play up front.

Arizona State blew up both theories. From a Tech standpoint, that’s depressing from many standpoints: This is supposed to be a rebuilding year in Tempe. The Sun Devils were sub-.500 last year, aren’t expected to do much better this year and have a new offensive coordinator and a new starting quarterback.

Miscellaneous . . . Texas Tech lost a commit, Jared Hocker, to TAMU. The Aggies offered last week and he said he has a handful of family members that went to TAMU. Texas Tech does have five other offensive line commits . . .