In this morning’s stake: the baseball team lost to Texas yesterday and will fact TCU today; football stats says that Texas Tech will improve and discussing coordinator impact.
Photo via Charles Henry @ Flickr.
Baseball
Texas Tech Loses 2-1 to Texas. This team just hasn’t had enough juice for the entire season. Cameron Smith pitched 6.1 solid innings, giving up just 2 runs, walking 2 and striking out 8, while Dominic Moreno was terrific in relif. The problem is that Parker French pitched a complete game, only gave up 1 run and that was the ball game. Just couldn’t get to French all game long. Texas Tech left 2 runners on base and Tim Proudfoot ended the game looking. Gotta get some big bats here next year.
Up later this morning, Texas Tech will take on TCU at 9:00 am and a preview (albeit a very short preview) is forthcoming.
All Big 12. Congrats to the six players that were named to the All-Big 12 teams, with Eric Gutierrez, Cameron Smith and Corey Taylor all making the first team, with Stephen Smith, Cory Raley and Dominic Moreno all making the second team. Tyler Neslony was honorable mention and Orlando Garcia made the All-Freshman Team.
Football
Advanced Stats. Yesterday, SB Nation’s Bill Connelly released his projected advanced stats for 2015 you may not be pleased to know that Texas Tech is sitting at 53. Not exactly ideal. I have no idea what this would project as a win total, but last year, Texas Tech finished 64th overall. The Land Grant Gauntlet’s Chris Ross compiled the Big 12 numbers and noted that, of all things, Oklahoma, is projected to finish the highest, but only at 10, while Baylor and TCU are 14th and 18th respectively. The top five teams are Alabama, Ohio State, Georgia, Oregon and Auburn.
Coordinator Impact. ESPN’s Brandon Chatmon and Jake Trotter consider which coordinator will make the biggest impact on a team and writes the portion on Texas Tech defensive coordinator David Gibbs and arrives that Gibbs has the biggest opportunity to make the biggest impact:
The Red Raiders aren’t going to turn into the ’85 Bears overnight. But if his track record is any indication, Gibbs will have his players in the right gaps and in the right coverages. They’ll force turnovers and limit big plays. And if they do nothing else, they’ll be much improved from last year.
Riley could — and probably will — make a huge splash in Norman. But no coordinator stands to make a bigger impact for his team than Gibbs.
Big 12 Schedules. Everyone’s favorite Oklahoma columnist, NewsOK’s Berry Tramel (beware auto-play) and he has Texas Tech as the third toughest schedule in the Big 12:
3. Texas Tech: Sam Houston State, Texas-El Paso, at Arkansas. You want to drive yourself batty? Try ranking these next five Big 12 schedules. All have one game against a power conference foes and one game against a I-AA team. None of the power league opponents are heavyweights. So I basically gave extra credit for road games. Playing in Fayetteville is a solid game for the Red Raiders.