Texas Tech Football: Portal Ranking Thoughts; Mathis & Karoll Commit

Hey gang, we are back with some high-level analysis (it’s really not high-level, it’s just time consuming and all I’ve done is put together some lists)!

As you all know, I have been following a few services to determine how good the portal class actually is and to be honest, it’s a big confusing. The rankings are a bit all over the place and depending on which service you use, you could make a case that your program is killing it or make the case that your program is falling apart. I also want to clarify that I made this list on Monday during the holiday (because I like to party) and so these likely have changed between now and then, but I don’t have time to actually go back and fix things. The three services I used are: On3; 24/7 Sports; and CFB Depth. They all use different methods to grade how well a class is doing. I am sure some of these take into account the players lost, the players committed, the quantity of players committed, the quality of players committed, and probably some sort of secret sauce that’s proprietary.

It was a bit difficult to gleam much from these lists, but there was a common thread. Three teams appeared in all 3 lists: Texas Tech; Texas A&M; and Indiana. Now, as mentioned, I did this on Monday before the game and if any players were going to get into the portal, they were probably going to do it after the game. You can choose to ignore the Hoosiers since they haven’t lost any players, but I am fully acknowledging it.

Let’s get to it.

On3 Team Transfer Portal Rankings: This does appear to take into account the transfers in and transfers out as well as the number of commits and they also use an “Index Score” that seems to be how they determine how good a class is. They’ve got Texas Tech, Indiana (for now), and Texas A&M as the top 3 classes with Houston and West Virginia there as part of the Big 12.

24/7 Sports Transfer Football Team Rankings: There’s no reference to the players lost, just to the players gained and this seems to be pretty weighted to the number of commits and also a good amount to the quality (Notre Dame is 10th overall, but only has 7 commits and they are all 4-stars). Again, Texas Tech, Texas A&M, and Indiana are on the list as well.

CFB Depth Team Talent Churn Rankings & Breakdowns: I think this is a pretty easy equation to figure out. They have an overall ranking for every player that they’ve graded through the season and they are simply subtracting the value of players who have left from the value of the players added, which gives them the “Net Churn” meaning, did you add mroe talent than what’s left.

When looking at all 3 lists, I thought that it would be good to find the common teams in the top 10, then I realized that’s not something that happened, so I then wondered if there were any teams other than Texas Tech who were in all 3 lists and sure enough, it was the Hoosiers and the Aggies. Because of the subjective nature of these things I think that it is good that you sort of have this confirmation bias that the class is really pretty good because 3 different services using 3 different methods of measuring success. And, I might add that even without Missouri edge Damon Wilson, this is a really good class with a lot of talent. Would adding some more talent push Texas Tech over the top, well, maybe. The “maybe” is because it may be just as important, if not more important, as to what’s there already on the roster and the development of the current roster. I don’t think the staff thinks that they cannot develop what’s on the roster currently because that’s not sustainable. If we can’t recognize the importance of that, well, that may be a discussion for another day, but it’s a discussion that we need to have.

As you’ll note, Kent State DE Jamond Mathis did commit to Texas Tech. Missouri edge Damon Wilson is likely to commit to Miami so don’t hold your breath on that one. Additionally, Texas Tech received a commitment last night from UCLA punter Will Karoll to replace Jack Burgess. That was needed and is good news.

Returning Players:

LT Howard Sampson
TE Terrance Carter, Jr.
CB Brice Pollock
RB J’Koby Williams
RB Cameron Dickey
RB Quinten Joyner

Portal Commits: If you are interested in prior coverage, you can check out the football category of STP.

Cincinnati QB Brendan Sorsby (6-3/235)
Tulsa QB Kirk Francis (6-1/200)
Alabama State IR Jalen Jones (5-9/175)
Liberty WR Donte Lee, Jr.(6-3/185)
Pittsburgh WR Kenny Johnson (6-1/205)
Auburn WR Malcolm Simmons (6-0/186)
Louisville OG Jordan Church (6-4/310)
Nevada TE Jett Carpenter (6-3/258)
Akron DL Julien Laventure (6-1/270)
Washington DL Bryce Butler (6-5/320)
Wake Forest DL Mateen Ibirogba (6-4/290)
San Diego State DE Trey White (6-2/255)
Oregon State DE Jojo Johnson (6-2/288)
Miami (OH) DE Adam Trick (6-4/249)
Kent State DE Jamond Mathis (6-3/245): Mathis had 28 total tackles last year, 8 tackles for a loss, and 6 of those were sacks with 6 quarterback hurries, and 3 passes broken up. In terms of CFB Depth grades, Mathis was the best defender with an overall grade of 15.5, pass rush grade of 14.8, run defense of 14.3, tackle grade of 10.9, and coverage grade of 12.5.
Kansas State LB Austin Romaine (6-2/232)
Houston LB Corey Platt, Jr. (6-2/215)
UTSA CB Davin Martin (6-2/165)
SFA K Jacob Hand (5-11/170)
UCLA P Will Karoll (6-4/210): Karoll had 44 punts last year for the Bruins and averaged 43.48 per punt and punted 3.7 times last year. Jack Burgess average 43.48 per punt last year, so a pretty similar player. As we are grading things, Karoll was a 13.5 on CFB Depth and Burgess was a 15.3.

Predictions: None as of right now.

None

Resources:

The Lady Raiders fell to BYU in Provo last night, 73-61 and they will look to get back on the winning side of the ledger when they play Utah on Saturday in Salt Lake City . . . Triple jumper Jonathan Seremes and high jumper Temitope Adeshina were named the Big 12 Athletes of the Week . . . Texas Tech football released their schedule for 2026 and it looks great but don’t know that I have a huge opinion because I don’t know what these teams will be in 2026 . . . four Red Raiders including NiJaree Canady, Mihyia Davis, Taylor Pannell and Kaitlyn Terry were named on USA Softball’s top 50 players to watch for 2026 . . . outfielder Logan Hughes was named a Preseason All-Big 12 selection by Perfect Game . . .