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Texas Tech football: Offense is not coming through in big moments

By Matthew Conner

LUBBOCK, TEXAS - OCTOBER 05: Wide receiver Erik Ezukanma #84 of the Texas Tech Red Raiders catches a pass during the second half of the college football game against the Oklahoma State Cowboys on October 05, 2019 at Jones AT&T Stadium in Lubbock, Texas. (Photo by John E. Moore III/Getty Images)
LUBBOCK, TEXAS - OCTOBER 05: Wide receiver Erik Ezukanma #84 of the Texas Tech Red Raiders catches a pass during the second half of the college football game against the Oklahoma State Cowboys on October 05, 2019 at Jones AT&T Stadium in Lubbock, Texas. (Photo by John E. Moore III/Getty Images) /
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(Photo by John E. Moore III/Getty Images)
(Photo by John E. Moore III/Getty Images) /

All season, the Texas Tech football team has been unable to come up with key drives when it had opportunities to put a game on ice and its failures in those moments are what have been this team’s undoing.

The pessimist will look at the 2019 Texas Tech football season and see a 4-6 record through 10 games, the likelihood of missing another bowl game, and a handful of close losses and be disgruntled with the fact that we are seeing more of the same from this program.

The optimist will look at the same data and interpret it as a good sign.  After all, Tech has been right in the fight most weeks despite being decimated by injuries.

The optimist will also take solace in the fact that Matt Wells’ team has fought as hard as we could ask it to regardless of the opponent.  That has not always been the case with this program over the years.

But regardless of your perspective, we can all agree that this was a year in which the Big 12 was set up for a middle-tier program to step forward and it has to be disappointing that once again, Tech was not able to be that team.  To make matters worse, it has been Baylor which has seized that opportunity.

Most years, there is a clear-cut class system in the conference with Oklahoma and Texas typically serving as the ruling class.  The rest of the common-folk programs then jockey for position and an opportunity to face one of the giants (almost always OU) in Arlington for the conference title.

But in 2019, the Big 12 has been uncharacteristically mediocre.  Texas started the year in the top 10 but has gone just 6-4 (4-3 in Big 12 play) while other usually strong programs such as TCU, Oklahoma State, and Kansas State have been inconsistent.  The lack of quality from this middle class in the conference allowed a team like Baylor, which is the worst 9-1 team any of us have ever seen, to make some noise.

Another oddity that Tech failed to capitalize on is the unprecedented amount of turnover among the league’s head coaches there was prior to this season.   With four programs in year-one of new coaching regimes, Tech had a chance to surpass expectations because it was essentially on the same footing as 30% of its competition.  In a typical year, there may be one or two coaching changes thus putting the team with a new staff at a considerable disadvantage.

However, this year, Tech was voted to finish 7th in the conference preseason poll which meant that the Red Raiders were thought to be in better shape than the other three programs in the league that made changes at the top.

While it is still mathematically possible for Tech to finish 7th, that’s not the point.  The point is that this year set up perfectly for a team in the bottom half of the conference to make a substantial jump and Tech failed to take advantage of that opportunity.

Making matters worse is the fact that in several of Tech’s losses this year, the Red Raiders had the ball in critical moments of the game and could do absolutely nothing with it.  Let’s take a look back at those instances because they will be the moments that we point to as the times when this season could have taken a much more exciting turn.

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