As new Texas Tech football head coach Matt Wells begins the process of rebuilding his program, he would be wise to follow the blueprint Chris Beard used as he turned Texas Tech basketball into a national contender in just three years.
When Kirby Hocutt hired Matt Wells to be the Texas Tech football head coach, he had to know that the former Utah State head coach was a very unpopular hire among the Red Raider fan base. After all, it seemed like everyone from high-influence boosters to online message board posters to inconsequential bloggers like yours truly voiced their opinions on who should replace Kliff Kingsbury and virtually none were beating the drum for Wells.
And though the general angst over Hocutt’s decision has dissipated significantly in the months since Wells’ arrival, the new face of Red Raider football still has a long way to go to win over the majority of the fan base. But Wells does not have to look far to find a coach who has put together a fantastic blueprint to follow when trying to earn the approval of a fandom that has grown cynical and apathetic.
After all, those adjectives would certainly describe most Texas Tech fans’ attitudes towards Red Raider basketball prior to Chris Beard’s arrival in 2016. Having suffered through five losing seasons in the six years before Beard took over the program, Tech hoops had not finished higher than seventh in the Big 12 since 2006-07.
Beard inherited a program that had seen five different head coaches in nine years and complied an overall record during that span of just 127-162 (0.439 winning percentage). But as we all know, Beard has had three-consecutive winning seasons compiling a mark of 71-29 (0.710).
Wells is in a similar situation. Tech has had just one winning football season in its last five years and in that Time, the Red Raiders have gone a mere 27-35 (0.435 winning percentage).
And as was the case with Red Raider basketball in the decade prior to the start of the Beard era, empty seats, fan disinterest and a lack of enthusiasm about the future has become the unfortunate reality of Red Raider football. But when Hocutt hired Wells, he said that he saw some similarities in his new football coach and his basketball coach.
"“I had the same feeling after I met with coach Wells as I did after I met with [baseball coach Tim] Tadlock and coach Beard.” Hocutt said. “When I walked away from that meeting, I had that same type of feeling, that this is a gentleman who knows what he’s doing, that is going to serve as a head coach and is going to be great leader for this program.”"
Of course, the cynical fans (of which I must count myself as part) think that Hocutt would have referenced the two home run hires he has made at Texas Tech regardless of who he would have eventually landed to lead the football program. But others are willing to take Hocutt at his word and are already starting to find similarities between Wells and the two most popular coaches on campus.
The truth is that Wells has not been in Lubbock long enough for anyone to know what we have in our next head coach. Right now, what fans see largely depends on what they want to see.
But if Wells can follow Chris Beard’s blueprint for building a program, he could breathe life back into a fan base that was at one time considered to be one of the most passionate and intense in the nation. Let’s take a look at the steps Beard has taken and see how Wells could follow in his footsteps.