Texas Tech football classics: Red Raiders hold off Nebraska in 2008
In 2008, the Texas Tech football team narrowly avoided an upset at the hands of Nebraska in what was an OT classic that no one expected.
When it came to the series with Nebraska, the last decade of the Cornhuskers’ run in the Big 12 had to feel like Bizarro World to the people in Lincoln. That’s because, as their once-dominant program began to fall on hard times, the Texas Tech football program took Nebraska’s place alongside Oklahoma and Texas in the upper echelon of the conference.
When the two programs met up in 2008 at Jones Stadium, it was the Red Raiders sporting a top-10 ranking while the Cornhuskers looked rather vulnerable. Tech was No. 7 in the nation and undefeated while the Huskers were just 3-2 and were reeling after two straight home losses, 35-30 to Virginia Tech and 52-17 to Missouri, the later of those coming on Homecoming in Lincoln.
Speaking of losing streaks, Nebraska was also riding a two-game slide in their series with Tech. Dating back to the first time the programs met in the 1976 Bluebonnet Bowl, NU has been 7-0 vs. the boys from the Hub City up to the famous 70-10 Red Raider win in Lubbock in 2004. A year later, Tech stunned Nebraska in Lincoln 34-31 in the game that saw Tech score the winning TD with just twelve seconds to play after NU fumbled away an interception that would have sealed the game.
Most expected the meeting between the Red Raiders and Huskers to be a breeze for the home team in 2008 given that Mike Leach’s program was surging behind the duo of QB Graham Harrell and WR Michael Crabtree while Nebraska was in the first year of the Bo Pelini era.
What’s more, this was the first road game of the year for Nebraska after playing five-straight games in their own stadium to open the season. That made them the last team in the nation to play a road game in 2008.
As for the 5-0 Red Raiders, they were fresh off of a 58-28 thumping of Kansas State in Manhattan. To this day, that remains the last time Tech was victorious in the Little Apple.
But though everyone in the stadium and around the college football world expected a blowout, what transpired on that chilly and drizzly October day was anything but a walk in the park for the home team. (If you want to watch this game in its entirety, you can do so here.) Let’s look back on this fascinating game because it nearly derailed the magical 2008 season before it even reached its halfway point.