Leading Off

How’s Your Day? I don’t know when I ran across this stuff, but at some point during my work life, I needed something that would track my day, someplace where I could write down the things that were actually happening in case I didn’t get to bill them. I eventually found this designer named Dave Seah who has these neat downloads where you could track your goals or your time or lots of other things. This year, I decided that I was going to do a weekly Day Grid Balancer. This was good for me because there are six things to check each day, each of these six things I sometimes struggle with them: sleep; create; happy; health; home; and converse. I’ve got 6 different colored pencils and at the end of the day, I color the boxes of the things that I accomplished.

For instance, yesterday wasn’t a good day for me conversing with my family. Work-stress made me irritable and that affected how I acted. So I didn’t color in those boxes and made note of it. I don’t know that I would have thought about that had I not reflected at the end of the day. These are six things that I normally really need to work on each day. It’s a good reminder to see how I’ve done. Anyway, the year is still young and if you need something to track your goals and your life, this is a pretty low-tech way (you just need 52 copies and 6 colored pencils, 1 for each week) for you to track your life. It’s free to download as long as you’re not using it for commercial purposes.

Texas Tech Track and Field

Get ready for the best meet in the country this weekend. 💯#WreckEm pic.twitter.com/HRfSXna5c4

— Texas Tech T&F/XC (@TexasTechTF) January 22, 2019

Texas Tech Tennis

✌️ straight singles wins including a victory over a top-25 opponent.

Tommy Mylnikov is your Big 12 Player of the Week.

🔴#WreckEm⚫️

📰👉: https://t.co/JXMS8d7dzB pic.twitter.com/jMFZp2IIGi

— Texas Tech Men’s Tennis (@TexasTechMTEN) January 22, 2019

Lady Raider Basketball

PREVIEW | Lady Raiders Travel to West Virginia for Midweek Matchuphttps://t.co/dnP9I7PwUb

— Lady Raider WBB (@LadyRaiderWBB) January 22, 2019

Feature on Sanders. A nice feature story from Courier & Press’ Chad Lindskog about senior forward Zuri Sanders, an Evansville, Indiana native:

Her work ethic, however, never wavered — at least that’s what Stollings has noticed since she arrived in Lubbock, Texas, after leading Minnesota to last year’s NCAA tournament.

The player-coach duo has developed a special bond considering Sanders is the team’s only senior.

“When you’re making a transition as a coach, you need people like Zuri from a leadership perspective who are ready for change and embrace it,” Stollings said. “This is my fourth time rebuilding a program, and she’s handled it better than anybody.”

Texas Tech Baseball

Preseason #8. Baseball America’s Joe Healy previews the Red Raiders and there’s good news at the link, but sometimes the things that this team will need to overcome is more interesting to discuss:

With the departures of a whole host of pitchers from last year’s squad, there are some questions about Texas Tech’s pitching staff beyond junior Caleb Killian, who will hold down the Friday starter’s job in 2019. Junior John McMillon, a prime candidate to slot in behind Killian in the rotation, has electric stuff, but he has struggled with consistency and control in his time in Lubbock. Sophomore Kurt Wilson, another rotation contender, appeared in 17 games last year, but had an 8.10 ERA. Freshman Mason Montgomery could get into the mix as well, but he’s obviously unproven. In the bullpen, junior Caleb Freeman has appeared in 33 games in his two seasons, but he’ll be asked to do more, and redshirt junior Erikson Lanning will look to bounce back after missing all but two games last season. Some subset of these pitchers will have to step up in a big way.

Texas Tech Football

Director of Recruiting = Gone. Via Don Williams on the Twitter, Matt Wells hired Katharine Sawyer as director of recruiting and she is apparently no longer on staff:

A Texas Tech spokesman confirms that Katharine Sawyer, announced on Jan. 5 as director of recruiting for football, “is no longer on staff, and coach Wells is currently looking to replace that position.” Asked why she’s no longer on staff, the spokesman said, “Personal reasons.”

I don’t know that I have much to write about that as it’s pretty vague so I’ll just let this be.