A cinematic recap of sorts.
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Offense: D
Kenny Johnson continues to emerge as a No. 1 receiver. The run, though again not as consistent as the Red Raiders need, helped down the stretch.
Defense: C
Remember that Texas Tech defense that completely shut down anything and everything? This one gave up three drives longer than 70 yards and two more that covered at least 55.
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McGuire strongly suggested this off-season that, even after losing all those defensive stalwarts, the Red Raiders could be just as good on defense this season.
I asked Friday night if he still believes that and, if so, how do the Red Raiders get back to that level? After all, this wasn’t a one-off. Oregon State’s young pitch-and-catch combo of Braden Atkinson and Jesse Legree skewered the pass defense the week before.
“Give me two more games,” McGuire said. “Let me have Trey White totally healthy, and let me have B.J. Jordan. Then I’ll answer that question, I promise. Because he [White] wasn’t a hundred percent. He probably played a few more snaps than we expected. We were trying to play him on third down and anytime we could rush the passer.”
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There was something off about this game. Friday nights are reserved for high school football in West Texas. Both Texan coaches — Texas Tech’s Joey McGuire and Houston’s Willie Fritz — protested the game’s presence on Friday night with hats honoring the Texas High School Coaches Association.
The 90-degree desert heat mixed with an alumni base often facing drives of more than five hours to Lubbock for football games. And yet, the stadium was packed at kickoff, awaiting perhaps the biggest game of the season.
“This is just what we do,” one alumnus told me after driving eight hours from Houston. “We show up for the Red Raiders.”
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‘Coogs don’t beat Coogs’
It’s a favorite line of coach Willie Fritz, and it rang true in the third quarter. On fourth-and-2 at the Tech 4, the Cougars lined up for what could have given them a 24-21 lead. But right guard McKenzie Agnello was called for a false start, and UH had to settle for Jonathan Dimas’ 28-yard field goal and trailed 21-20 entering the fourth quarter. “When you play a close ball game like that, you have to play close to error-free, and we did not,” Fritz said.
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“That was my fault, 1,000%,” Johnson said. “And the throw before that, the one down there, that was my fault as well. It was a lot going on. I’m not used to playing home games with that many people. I think I got a little too amped up. I think I was pressing a little bit, trying to go make a play, and pressing doesn’t usually get you anything good.”
Hammond didn’t lose confidence in looking Johnson’s way, even if it confused the rest of the offense. On Tech’s first scoring drive of the night, cutting into Houston’s 10-0 lead at the time, Hammond called an audible at the line that left Terrance Carter Jr., Coy Eakin and head coach Joey McGuire wondering what was happening.
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“We beat a ranked opponent tonight. That was huge,” McGuire said. “Maybe I’m wrong, we’ll see, but I do truly believe we’re trying to find ourselves.”
The truth is, Texas Tech doesn’t need to be as good as last year to contend for the Big 12 title. Houston might be the best opponent on its schedule; the Cougars looked like a conference contender. Tech’s toughest remaining games are likely Arizona State and Arizona — both come to Lubbock — and a November road trip to face an Oklahoma State team that lost to Tulsa and beat Oregon.
But Tech wants more. It wants the Big 12 to run through Lubbock. It wants to win Playoff games. It has championship ambitions and the resources to get there.
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The Big 12 is often considered the standard-bearer for unpredictability and top-to-bottom competitiveness. In the league’s latest 16-team iteration, there isn’t a large gap in roster talent or resources, and that’s reflected in the roster budgets, too (except Texas Tech, of course).
The player-spending separation between the No. 2 and No. 16 team in the Big 12 appears to be no more than $12 million and possibly as low as $9 million. That’s a big difference from the ACC ($21 million-$24 million difference between last and second), the SEC ($25 million) and the Big Ten ($32 million-$38 million).