Texas Tech Softball

Career game for the senior as Tech surges to a 12-5 win at UT Arlington.

RECAP 👇https://t.co/VZVjgQFNAW #WreckEm pic.twitter.com/JRwmgdgAFw

— Texas Tech Softball (@TexasTechSB) February 14, 2018

Texas Tech Baseball

Congrats to Josh Jung on being named to the Bobby Bragan Collegiate Slugger Award Watch List!

📝➡ https://t.co/F7ng0hNOL4 #WreckEm pic.twitter.com/pLO0rUYF2L

— Texas Tech Baseball (@TTU_Baseball) February 13, 2018

Regional Projections. Yes, the season hasn’t even started, but D1Baseball already has out their field of 64 with Texas Tech projected to host a regional with Yale, Clemson and Maryland in the mix. TCU is also projected to host a regional as well.

Texas Tech Basketball

Taking Down Kansas. SI’s Chris Johnson writes about why Kansas hasn’t been great this year (this is true, they are not normally the team that they are, especially defensively) and this was written yesterday, before last night’s games, but here’s a bit about how the Jayhawks just haven’t been as good defensively:

Kansas just isn’t getting enough stops to avoid getting tripped up in the most challenging conference in the country. The Jayhawks are yielding 1.085 points per possession in Big 12 play, which ranks fifth in the conference, but in their four league losses they’ve given up 1.23 PPP (Baylor), 1.22 PPP (Oklahoma State), 1.15 PPP (Oklahoma) and 1.18 PPP (Texas Tech). Conference opponents are making a lot of shots inside the three-point arc against Kansas, and they’re getting extra chances to take those shots by cleaning the offensive glass. The Jayhawks have allowed Big 12 teams to convert 50.9% of their 2s, the third highest percentage in the league, and pull down a league-high 36.3% of their misses.

Texas Tech Football

Contract Details.

New #TexasTech OC Kevin Johns will make $380K a year for two years under terms of an offer letter he signed Jan. 24. New DBs coach Clay Jennings signed offer letter Jan. 11 of $250K for 1 year. New S coach Brett Dewhurst signed 1-year contract Tuesday for $150K.

— Don Williams (@AJ_DonWilliams) February 14, 2018

That’s Don Williams tweeting out some football news during a big basketball game and not at all surprising that Johns gets a two-year deal. I’ll be interested to see how this affects Texas Tech’s overall standing when we look at assistant coach salaries.

Attendance Drops for College Football. This isn’t specific to Texas Tech, but CBS Sports’ Dennis Dodds has the numbers on how the attendance figures for college football dropped last year, the biggest drop in 34 years:

Attendance among the 129 Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) teams in 2017 was down an average of 1,409 fans per game from 2016. That marked the largest drop since 1983 when average attendance declined 1,527 fans per game from 1982.

The 2017 FBS average of 42,203 fans per game is the lowest since 1997.

That average attendance drop marked the second-sharpest decline since the NCAA began keeping track of college football attendance in 1948. For the first time in history, average attendance declined nationally for four consecutive seasons.

The 2017 numbers include FBS home games, neutral-site games, bowl games and the College Football Playoff.

Since establishing an all-time high average attendance in 2008 (46,971), FBS attendance has slipped a record 10.1 percent over the last nine years.

I find this interesting, but not surprising because I think at some point, there’s just only so many people, and building bigger and bigger stadiums is somewhat difficult to justify. At some point, there is over-saturation of a product. I know the NFL has had their own issues, but it isn’t surprising to see college football drop too without those issues. As Dodds writes, even the SEC dropped in attendance. It’s really comfortable staying at home rather than going to the games, and Dodds even mentions that:

College sports has long been at odds with how to manage the time/value relationship. In other words, how to make attendance at a live event more valuable than the alternatives, which range from remaining at a tailgate outside the venue to viewing on a smartphone while on the go to watching in the comfort of one’s living room.

“It’s a technology issue,” said Wright Waters, Football Bowl Association executive director and former Sun Belt commissioner. “The public is ahead of us every day in what they can get from technology. We have not been able to keep up.”

One former Power Five athletic director called it a “societal shift” leading the powers that be scrambling to figure out the viewing habits of millennials as well as well-heeled alumni.

“This is not surprising to me,” said Bill Lutzen, a veteran sports TV programmer who is currently the CFO of a web optimization firm. “This issue is with lack of involvement of the college students. They no longer view attending sporting events as part of the university experience.”