Texas Tech football: What Red Raider fans should be thankful for
Today is a day of gratitude in America so let’s take a look at what Texas Tech football fans have to be thankful for this Thanksgiving.
Iconic American essayist and poet Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “Cultivate the habit of being grateful for every good thing that comes to you, and to give thanks continuously. And because all things have contributed to your advancement, you should include all things in your gratitude.” Perhaps that’s a message that Texas Tech football fans should consider this Thanksgiving.
Certainly, when trying to wrap our heads around the state of Red Raider football, there’s a difficulty in being grateful. That’s because all of us can remember where we were just a decade ago and realize that we are about as far from that place as any of us could have ever imagined we’d be.
Even the most dedicated of fans are finding it tough to remain steadfast in their support of a program that has managed to fall to the absolute bottom of the Big 12 where it is now thought of as being closer to Kansas than any other program.
The truth is that no one will fault any Tech fan for turning cynical and jaded over the past decade. The scars are plenty and the disappointments continue to mount.
We’ve been through three head coaches, seven defensive coordinators, and eleven starting quarterbacks. We’ve lost games to every team in the Big 12, including Kansas, as well as two from the SEC and two from the PAC 12. Meanwhile, we haven’t enjoyed a home win over Oklahoma since 2009 nor have we experienced a win at home over Texas since 2008 or a win over TCU at home since 2013.
We’ve seen Jones Stadium devolve from a madhouse where no one wanted to play to a house of sadness for the home fans as wins over Big 12 teams have become almost as rare as sightings of Halley’s Comet.
But if we don’t take time to be thankful for what we still have, we might go insane. After all, outside of each year’s national champion, every program in the country has something to be pessimistic about.
While the state of Texas Tech football is about as far from where we want it to be as it’s been in most of our lifetimes, it’s still a program to be proud of when you look at the context of putting Tech against other programs in the nation from a historical perspective.
Despite being the third youngest Power 5 program in the nation ahead of only Miami (which started football in 1926) and Florida State (which didn’t begin play until 1945), Tech sits at 72nd nationally among all programs in wins, has the 60th-most weeks spent in the A.P. Poll, and has produced 12 consensus All-Americans, which is 47th all-time.
When you stop to think about what Texas Tech has had to overcome as both a school and a football program, there’s no way one can’t be somewhat amazed. Certainly, we all can be proud of what’s been built in Lubbock, even if recent results have been frustrating.
So against the backdrop of gratitude, let’s look at what Red Raider football fans have to be thankful for. If for only one day, let’s all put aside our disappointment over the 2019 season and look at a few positives we have going for us. Don’t worry, the negatives will be waiting for us again tomorrow at 11 am.