Let’s start off with me. As you may recall, I was essentially unable to walk on June 19th, the day I drove to Lubbock with Youssouf to take him to the football camp. I had done something to my back and was basically unable to walk more than 4 steps without stopping and having to take a break. Fast forward 2 and a half months and I’m going to run 50k with my brother in Washington State on Saturday, yes, the same Washington State where Texas Tech will play. I’ll be running 50k somewhere in Port Angeles and Olympic National Park area and I hope to catch some or most of the game that evening. [As an aside, I signed up for this with my brother back in January, so I consider it a minor miracle that I’m able to do this and and very grateful that I feel capable of doing this.] Next week may be a bit light, Tuesday in particular. I fly back into town on Monday and will head straight for Youssouf’s first 7th grade football game where he’s the the running back, safety, kick returner, kicker, and punter. Things sort of feel like they are coming full circle in a way. I will update you all on how the game goes, Kaufman Junior High is playing Lancaster so it will be a tough game, but he is supremely confident in his abilities.

Jake Dickert is the head coach for Wazzu, this being his 4th year for the Cougars and Dickert is only 41 years old. Dickert ended his playing career in 2007 and then bounced around North Dakota State, Southeast Missouri State, Wyoming, and then Washington State. Despite playing quarterback, Dickert has mainly been a defensive coach through his career and has a 15-16 record as a head coach at Washington State.

The offensive coordinator is Ben Arbuckle and I would guarantee that McGuire knows him. Played at Canadian High School and threw for 7,500 yards and 95 touchdowns in high school. His coaching career is incredibly short, starting as offensive quality control coach at Houston Baptist when Zach Kittley was there and then worked as the offensive coordinator at Seminole High School, then jumped right into the OC role at Western Kentucky and then at Washington State. His offense at WKU was 6th in the nation in yards per game, and my guess is that he’s used to absolutely slinging it around.

Jeff Schmedding is at the defensive coordinator spot, having played at Eastern Washington and spent 12 years there in some form or fashion. Was hired at Boise State, then Auburn as the linebackers coach and then DC before heading back home to Washington State.

STOCK UP:

+ I’m definitely going stock up on the receivers and Behren Morton. I don’t care if it was ACU, Josh Kelly is legit, Caleb Douglas and Coy Eakin can play and I NEED to see more Micah Hudson.

+ Drae McCray is really good and if there’s a way to get him into the slot more I’d be for it.

+ The ability of Jalin Conyers to get a foot down was something special. I don’t know why our tight ends aren’t open more, but I feel like they should be.

+ Jayden Cofield could have been benched after the the roughing the passer, but I like it when players battle back and prove themselves. He wasn’t even credited with a sack (I don’t think), but he was giving it his all that final play and I get that the score wasn’t ideal, he was trying to make an impact.

+ If you are looking at silver lining things, Washington State allowed 215 yards rushing against Portland State and 4.5 yards a rush.

STOCK DOWN:

– I think I am most disappointed with the missed tackles and missed assignments, but maybe that’s to be expected with a young team. Maybe the takeaway is that with a young team you are going to have assignments missed and just not being lined up in the right spots. But that shouldn’t be the case in year 3 of DeRuyter and I am sure he’s as frustrated as anyone for simply not being where you are supposed to be. Maybe that’s just inexperience, but I simply cannot buy that.

– What I can’t understand is the missed tackles. I’d like to tell you that that this is youth and inexperience, but I’m not buying it.

– The days of me being angry as a fan are pretty well over. It’s been over for a while and I find no utility in being angry. Largely because it doesn’t serve a purpose, it makes for a bad weekend, and my kids and wife deserve the best version of me. Being angry doesn’t serve that.

– There was definitely a time where I tried desperately to explain why things were the way they were. Those were the days of Tuberville and Neal Brown and then Kliff Kingsbury and Matt Wells. I felt like I needed to explain things, mostly because I didn’t want people to quit on the season and just walk away from all of this. I’ve tried to get away from that, but old habits die hard, but I think I’m better about this. I also realized that people really don’t want to quit the pain and suffering and agony and those people that are angry or threaten to quite are just hollow threats.

– I think the other part of the equation is that I want this team to succeed so bad that I’m willing to allow things and that would definitely apply to Joey McGuire. As stated above, I realize that this is a flaw of mine, but I don’t want to see another rebuild.

– Washington State’s quarterback threw for 352 yards and 5 touchdowns on just 17 attempts.

BIG 12 PUZZLE:

Last Week: Colorado took care of business against North Dakota State, but it was close and a near Hail Mary almost upended the Buff’s start. Joe Horn, Jr. and Travis Hunter may be the best two receivers in the nation and Sheduer Sanders can sling it. TCU survived Stanford and Josh Hoover threw for 353 yards. Penn State took care of business in Morgantown against West Virginia, and Oklahoma State beat South Dakota State by 24. Arizona messed around a bit with New Mexico before winning by 22 and Cincinnati beat Towson by 18. Houston only managed 7 points in a 27-7 loss to UNLV.

Kansas State, Baylor, Arizona State, BYU, UCF, Kansas, and Utah all throttled their respective opponents.

This Week: The biggest games this week are BYU at SMU on Friday night, while Oklahoma State hosts Arkansas, Pitt visits Cincinnati, Iowa State is at Iowa, Kansas i sat Illinois, Colorado is at Nebraska, Mississippi State at Arizona State, and we get Big 12 games with Houston at Oklahoma and Baylor at Utah.

NEWS:

The volley ball team finished the weekend 2-1, beating Eastern Kentucky in straight sets, then falling to Boston College in straight sets as well. Saturday, they bounced back beating Iona 3-0. They’ll host the Red Raider Classic starting on Thursday with matches against Northern Arizona, Florida Atlantic and Green Bay.

Texas Tech soccer won easily against Weber State on Thursday night, 4-0, and then easily dispatched Oral Roberts on Sunday, 5-0. It marked Tom Stone’s 200th win of his career at Texas Tech. The ladies will host Oregon on Thursday and then start conference play against TCU on September 12th.

Lubbock Avalanche-Journal’s Nathan Giese: How Abilene Christian’s Texas Tech football castoffs almost pulled the season-opening upset

Texas Tech’s past and present squared off on Saturday night with McIvor and Behren Morton going toe-to-toe, McIvor trying to show the Lubbock faithful what could’ve been and Morton looking to prove what still could be. Both accomplished that feat.

McIvor went 36-for-51 for 506 yards and a trio of touchdowns. Morton was equally solid, completing 30 of his 41 passes for 378 yards (one yard shy of tying his career-high) and five touchdowns (a career-high). Neither quarterback was intercepted, both with star moments throughout the 52-51 thriller that Tech won in overtime.

After Morton broke free to hit Caleb Douglas for the go-ahead score to open overtime, McIvor had the chance to win. Isaiah Johnson — another Lubbock-Cooper alum — got his third score of the game and Patterson knew if the Wildcats got the touchdown, they were going for two.

Inside the Red Raiders’ Joe Yeager: Supplementary Thoughts on Sunday

* In Joey McGuire’s first two seasons at Texas Tech, the Red Raiders never really hit their stride until late in the year. In 2022, they were 4-5 after nine games, and concluded the season with four straight wins. Last season, the Red Raiders were 3-5 after eight games, before winning four of their last five tilts to finish 7-6. Both teams, in other words, were headed for losing records but spared themselves that fate by finishing very strongly. If that trend continues, the dreadful showing against Abilene Christian will be seen as just another example of one of McGuire’s team’s soiling the bed linen in the first two-thirds of the season, prior to saving that campaign with a late rush. There may actually be some hope in that, although at some point finishing just a hair above .500 may not feed the bulldog.

Dallas Morning News’ Justin Apodaca: 5 takeaways from Texas Tech–Abilene Christian: Red Raider defense struggles in ugly OT win

Tech defensive youth struggles to keep ACU in check
The Red Raider secondary was down its top corner in Bralyn Lux against the Wildcats, but expected contributors for the Red Raiders struggled in their first action at the collegiate level.

Maurion Horn and Jalon Peoples are a pair of red-shirt sophomore corners who have been squarely in the two-deep for Tech heading into the season, and both looked like they were inexperienced players for Tech.

The Wildcats were led by 6-foot-5 receiver Blayne Taylor, who took a 71-yard reception to the house for a touchdown in the first half.

“You could check off everything that could go wrong in the back end at different times,” McGuire said. “But it was a mixture, you know, a mixture of those guys making plays, it’s a mixture of, I think four of the five guys that we started tonight in the secondary, that was their first college start… We definitely have got to improve in a hurry in the secondary, especially with the team that we’re about to play.”

KCBD: 1 arrested after ACU bus crash leaves 4 injured following TTU football game — Drunk drivers are the absolute worst.