The Morning Stake: March 17th

Campus Photos

Lots of terrific new photos yesterday from TTU Red. click on the date of one of those tweets to get to more photos.

Golf

Tennis

Softball

Football

The game will be broadcast on FOXSportsSW+ if you didn’t get tickets. I’ll be there with my kiddos and friends. Next week, we’ll try to hammer out plans about where the STP contingent will meet up.

Buy your very own Staking The Plains t-shirt at the Staking The Plains Threadless Shop. Click on that danged shirt (or the link).

ESPN’s Jake Trotter ranked the Big 12 triplets and had Texas Tech’s group 6th overall:

Giles was a second-team All-Big 12 selection and leads a receiving corps that should be among the better ones in the league. Ward rushed for more than 82 yards in each of his final four games after taking over as the primary ball carrier. Shimonek obviously has Patrick Mahomes’ massive shoes to fill, but shined in his lone half (271 yards, four TDs) of meaningful action.

LAJ’s Don Williams has the first part of a Q&A with strength and conditioning coach Rusty Whitt. The entire thing is worth your time and Whitt goes into how he entered the program and how he had to establish accountability, initially through the staff, but now that accountability is set by the players. And those players that set those standards are established by the team and this is the most interesting thing were the players picked by the team:

The eight team leaders are receivers Cameron Batson and Dylan Cantrell, running back Justin Stockton, quarterback Nic Shimonek, defensive linemen Broderick Washington, Eli Howard and Kolin Hill and safety Jah’Shawn Johnson.

That’s some of the players I would have thought, but there are some there that I wouldn’t have expected. It’s really insightful to hear what Whitt thinks about each of these players, but here’s his thoughts on Broderick Washington and Eli Howard, but I recommend reading the rest:

A-J: Broderick Washington, that’s pretty good for a guy that young to be in that role.

Whitt: “I tell you what, now Broderick is a very determined young man. He is the role model in the weight room. He is constantly pushing himself. Constantly, if you’re within earshot of him, you’re going to hear him yelling at you to get better. He is very strong. He is going to be one of the strongest players in this conference before it’s all said and done. He’s already squatting in the 600 range. His bench is in the low 400 range and he’s going to power clean probably 330 from the floor, so I’m really impressed with his work standard.”

A-J: Eli Howard must be pretty impressive, too, to be a player who’s only been here for a short period.

Whitt: “He’s very articulate. He speaks well in front of the kids, and kids respect his approach and he’s very consistent. His mood is the same every day, very determined and he’s not afraid to jump on a guy about anything.”

A-J: How big is he now?

Whitt: “He’s probably in the 270 range. He needs to gain a little bit of weight, but he looks pretty good for that (defensive) end spot. Maybe 265. He had a knee issue a year ago that he’s pretty much … We haven’t heard any kind of grief about it. So he’s overcome that.”

Miscellaneous . . .

  • Via the LAJ, Jakeem Grant is schedule for an autograph signing at Lone Star Sports Collectibles on Saturday from 2:00 to 3:30 pm. Check the link for details.
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