With the reputation of a consistent bowl team and an 8-5 finish in 2024, Texas Tech football is no pushover. However, it’s not exactly what you would call a contender…at least until NOW, anyways.
That’s right, the Red Raiders are officially in the hunt for a Big 12 title and subsequent playoff spot. They recently earned this status through two factors: Their conference being relatively up for grabs, and Indiana head coach Curt Cignetti accusing them of funneling millions upon millions of dollars into their roster.
Now regardless of whether Cignetti’s claim is accurate (he hasn’t been above fibbing in the past, even when discussing his own team), it nonetheless was enough to push me over the edge in my research on TTU’s upcoming schedule, as that tells me more than anything some random coach ever could. Therefore, let’s give that a look, shall we?
The beginning to Texas Tech’s slate is rather elementary
The first thing we see is that the Red Raiders have a start to their 2025 campaign that is about as accommodating as can be, as they open with three-straight home games against Arkansas Pine-Bluff, Kent State and Oregon State. Each of those should not only result in wins, but convincing ones.
The scale is straightened out a fair deal with the road opener being at a jarring Utah, but that shift is then immediately halted thanks to Tech’s first bye. So just one loss a third of the way through the season, and the first drop in momentum being neutralized by a week off? We’ll take that for sure.
And that week off was well-placed too, as after it comes what I think will be another promising tear for the Red Raiders, as I see them being readily equipped to take on Houston and Kansas, with the latter being in Lubbock for TTU’s Homecoming game.
They’re off to Tempe after that to face Arizona State, the Big 12’s defending champ—another dip. But once again, it’s a short one, as next up from there is Oklahoma State, which was the exact opposite of ASU by going 3-9.
The final games for the Red Raiders will be their toughest
Six wins, two losses, sitting pretty. In fact, that is more fortuitous than you may even realize, as it means Tech is built to endure the grueling collapse I have it suffering in these final four games, all starting with a trip to Manhattan to take on Kansas State.
The Wildcats have established themselves as being formidable on an annual basis and bring a brutal home environment to the table—they’ll be a loss. The BYU Cougars come into play the very next Saturday, and they’d beat the Red Raiders no matter where they met, so that’s another defeat. From there, a struggling UCF with a new head coach will help put a little bit of wind back in Tech’s sails before its second bye.
Finally, last but not least, we take a trek into Morgantown to battle the West Virginia Mountaineers…they’re not great. Along with finishing negative last year, they got ran off the field by TTU, 52-15. With all of that said, I’m going almost solely on a hunch when I say that the Mountaineers get payback this fall.
Simply put, it just sounds so poetic for them to be out for blood, during their senior day, with their John Denver-echoing crowd going absolutely wild, and shutting down the Red Raiders in an awesome conclusion to the regular season. That’s what college football is all about, after all.
But even with that last-minute buzzkill, my ultimate tally for Texas Tech is 7-5, leaving a chance for us to get the exact same record, and vibes as last year: “Meh, decent.” Does that meet the standard that’s been set for the team, though? Not quite.