Yesterday was a whirlwind of a day. I was already asleep on Sunday when news broke that Joey McGuire would be Texas Tech’s next head coach. I thought that this was something that might take a bit of time to sort out. Not that I doubted the report, I wouldn’t have done yesterday’s morning post if I didn’t believe it,

But then I think that Texas Tech football went from 0 to 60 in a snap.

McGuire was announced as Texas Tech’s new head coach some time before the lunch hour. A press conference was set for noon today to introduce McGuire and then things really started happening.

By the time that dinner time arrived McGuire became a one-man recruiting whirling dervish, offering a handful of players. Check that. Two handfuls of players, maybe three. By the time I started writing this, Texas Tech had two commits.

* Jalon Peoples (6-0/175) is a cornerback from Cedar Hill who had 30+ offers and is a 3-star player with an 87 composite grade.

* Harvey Dyson (6-3/260) is a defensive tackle from Cedar Hill (notice a trend?) who had 8 offers and is a 3-star player with no composite grade just yet.

After I went to sleep and there was another commit.

* Syncere Massey (6-5/280) is a defensive tackle from Cedar Hill (trend confirmed) who had 13 offers and is a 3-star player with a composite grade of 85 and previously committed to Arizona State.

I can’t exactly remember where I heard this, but Rob Breaux was talking to Matt Clare, who is a recruiting expert for Red Raider Sports, and Clare was asked where Texas Tech recruiting is in comparison to the other Big 12 teams and Clare said 8 years. That’s darn near a decade of Texas Tech ineptness and it doesn’t fall on just one guy, but there was a clear distinction when Matt Wells took over.

When Wells was hired in December he had to hold on tight with the recruiting class that Kliff Kingsbury recruited and then had to learn all of the Texas players, coaches, and highways and byways because he said he recruited Texas, but not like this.

With McGuire being hired the question is how many years/months/days it’s going to take for him to put Texas Tech back on the map.

I remember when Kirby Hocutt had the press conference was let go, he was asked specifically about Wells’ recruiting methods and Hocutt said that he had discussions with Wells, attempting to take advantage of the transfer market and have a relatively small class.

That’s obviously going to change significantly with McGuire at the helm.

There’s obviously a risk here. The biggest is that McGuire has never been a coordinator or a head coach other than at the high school level. The key here is that there’s risk with any hire. Mark Adams has never been a Division I coach. Ever. Not being a head coach isn’t a death knell for sure, but it is also something that’s a bit of an issue for those of you that are concerned. The hope is that the recruiting acumen can outweigh the head coaching experience.

What Texas Tech has done is hire the lead recruiter as the head coach. Usually that’s reserved for the running back coach, but the head man will be the point person for recruiting. That’s something that I don’t know has happened all that much.

And if there’s a downside, there’s an upside too. To summarize the past handful of hires, Tommy Tuberville just wasn’t smart and never wanted to be in Lubbock. Kliff Kingsbury was green and didn’t know coaches and also failed to recruit towards the end of his tenure. Matt Wells lacked that thing where he was able to connect with the community and lacked Texas ties that I think he eventually gained, but did not believe that recruiting high school players was the way to move forward.

McGuire has connections. He has a willingness to be at Texas Tech, evidenced by his daughter graduating from Texas Tech in 2018, obviously loves to recruit, has immediately connected with the community (so many comparisons to Spike Dykes), and has recruited the heck out of high school players (all 3 of them defensive) within hours on the job.

And it is now 4:48 am and I’ve run out of time to continue writing. Time to publish.

Consider this your open thread for McGuire’s press conference set at noon today.