Without Texas Tech football, this is not golden era of Red Raider sports

With four Big 12 titles this spring and a national title game appearance in men’s basketball, the Texas Tech athletic department is riding high. But that success still feels a little bit hollow given the troublesome state of Texas Tech football.

There are currently four Big 12 titles residing in Lubbock, Texas. For an athletic department that was a relative non-factor in the spring semester sports a decade ago, the success of the men’s basketball, track and baseball teams as well as the rise of Texas Tech softball, golf and tennis has made the Texas Tech athletic department the dominant force in the conference, especially in the second half of the school year. But for all this success, there remains a tremendous void in the athletic program that can only be filled by the Texas Tech football program.

Certainly, there’s no way any Red Raider fan will soon take for granted success of the basketball program under Chris Beard or the baseball program under Tim Tadlock. In the ten years prior to Beard’s arrival, Tech had reached the NCAA Tournament just twice, losing in the first round in both 2007 and 2016. And in the decade before Tadlock took over the baseball program, the Red Raiders went to the NCAA Tournament just once.

But because of a national title game appearance in basketball and three trips to the College World Series, Red Raider fans are growing accustomed to playing on the biggest stages in the nation. That combined with the track program’s five conference titles since 2014 under head coach Wes Kittley and the return to the NCAA Tournament of the Red Raider softball team has many saying that this is the golden age of Texas Tech athletics.

While that may be true in the minds of some, it all feels rather hollow knowing that the most important and popular program on campus is as far from Big 12 contention as any program at the university. And for this to truly be the golden era of Tech sports, the football program must be part of the equation.

Make no mistake, this is still Texas and that means only one sport is truly king; football. They don’t make movies and television programs about Texas high school basketball. When people from around the nation talk about the Lone Star State’s many obsessions and quirks, they don’t bring up an obsession with baseball.

Football is as ingrained in Texans as Whataburger, Dr. Pepper, Mexican food and pickup trucks. And even at Texas Tech, where the basketball team has now stolen the headlines and the adoration of much of the fan base, football remains the university’s biggest athletic priority.

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After all, consider the difference in the amount of money dedicated to football relative to how much money is spent in other programs. While the size of a football roster demands that more of a program’s athletic budge be pumped into that sport, the reality is that no program at Tech has come close to receiving the type of facility upgrades in the past 20 years as has the football team.

In fact, the Texas Tech Campaign for Fearless Champions, a fundraising effort for the enhancement of athletic facilities across the athletic department, lists 28 projects to be completed. Of those, nearly a third (nine to be exact) were for the football program. That included the construction of an indoor practice facility, locker room renovations and the yet to be started south end zone building renovation project that will easily exceed $100 million.

Meanwhile, the basketball program, despite all its recent success is set to receive just three minor upgrades in addition to the $20 million privately funded Womble Practice Facility. And the baseball team? They were earmarked for only three projects, a new video board and playing surface, roof renovations to Rip Griffin Park and an upgrade of the locker rooms.

This isn’t to suggest that basketball and baseball are afterthoughts in Lubbock. Certainly, the record season ticket sales for both programs suggests otherwise. And we are all thrilled with being national contenders in two of the most prominent NCAA sports.

But even in the midst of our most successful runs in those two sports, we continually fret over and bemoan the fall from prominence of our football program. However, a decade ago when Red Raider football was occupying a spot in the national lexicon similar to that being enjoyed by Beard’s basketball program right now, we were almost oblivious to what the other programs on campus were doing.

When the Texas Tech basketball team went just 16-15 in 2007-08 and 14-19 in 2008-09, the angst among Red Raider fans was nowhere near the levels that is has been towards the football team in the last two years. And hardly anyone noticed that during that same time span, the baseball team was a combined four games below .500. That’s because when we had a nationally relevant football program, everything else was of far less consequence.

But as our football program has floundered and fan frustration has evolved into cynicism and apathy, we have had to explore other avenues for ways to bolster our Red Raider sports pride. And thank God Chris Beard and Tim Tadlock have been able to give us what we’ve needed.

Still, we live in the most football-obsessed state in what is a football-obsessed nation. No one sits around the office and brags to their coworkers about the success of their school’s track program nor do we stride pridefully into church wearing a Texas Tech polo the morning after the softball team is selected for the NCAA Tournament.

And while we will all continue to be fully invested in the success of the baseball and basketball programs, we know that most fans from other Big 12 schools will counter our success in those sports with the “Yeah, but how did you do against us in football?” and deep down, it will bother us.

I never thought I would see Texas Tech basketball become a legitimate national contender and as a season ticket holder that drives six hours round-trip to see Beard’s team play, I couldn’t be more excited about the state of the program. And baseball has been our most consistent men’s program making the exploits of Tadlock’s squad all the more fulfilling.

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But for the Texas Tech athletic program to reach a state of nirvana, the most important program on campus, the one that is responsible for the lion’s share of the overall athletic budget, has to be included in the success. Only when Red Raider football is able to become “elite” as Kirby Houctt promised us it would under Matt Wells, will we truly in the golden era of Texas Tech athletics.

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