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Texas Tech football: Ranking 2020 games by importance for Matt Wells (No. 1-6)

By Matthew Conner

LUBBOCK, TEXAS - NOVEMBER 23: Head coach Matt Wells of the Texas Tech Red Raiders looks on during a timeout huddle during the second half of the college football game against the Kansas State Wildcats on November 23, 2019 at Jones AT&T Stadium in Lubbock, Texas. (Photo by John E. Moore III/Getty Images)
LUBBOCK, TEXAS - NOVEMBER 23: Head coach Matt Wells of the Texas Tech Red Raiders looks on during a timeout huddle during the second half of the college football game against the Kansas State Wildcats on November 23, 2019 at Jones AT&T Stadium in Lubbock, Texas. (Photo by John E. Moore III/Getty Images) /
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T.J. Vasher #9 of the Texas Tech Red Raiders (Photo by Richard Rodriguez/Getty Images)
T.J. Vasher #9 of the Texas Tech Red Raiders (Photo by Richard Rodriguez/Getty Images) /

No. 1 – Baylor

The most important game for Wells to win this year is the October 15 home game with Baylor.  Set for a national ESPN Thursday night broadcast, this will be a game that Red Raider fans have circled on the calendar after last year’s screw job in Waco.

Make no mistake, the hatred for Baylor is significant and it is only growing after the Big 12 officials robbed the Red Raiders of an OT win last year on a botched fumble call.  Thus, we want nothing more than to take out our frustrations on the Bears when they make their first trip to Lubbock since 2008.

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No program in the Big 12 is more universally hated than Baylor thanks to the Art Briles fiasco.  But Tech fans have had to begrudgingly give this devil its due over the last two years.

However, the architect of that turnaround, Matt Rhule, is now in the NFL and this needs to be a turning point for the Red Raiders in a rivalry that has seen the once lowly BU program claim seven of the last nine meetings to hold a one-game edge in the all-time series, 39-38.

It is unacceptable for any Red Raider football fan to have to consider our program as lesser than Baylor but that’s where we’ve been for most of the last decade.  For a generation of fans that grew up knowing Baylor as the joke of the conference, that’s not sitting well and it must end in 2020.

What’s more, Wells needs to send a message that the Dave Aranda era of Baylor football is not going to experience the same success against Tech that the Briles and Rhule eras did.  If he can’t, the fan base is going to be livid at the thought of spending another untold number of years looking up at Baylor.

Also, this game is massive on the recruiting trail as these teams seem to tangle over the same recruits as often as the groomsmen clash for the only single bridesmaid at a wedding.  Baylor already has the proximity to DFW and Houston working it its favor.  It can’t also have an edge on the scoreboard to point to anymore.

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There was a time when beating Baylor in football was as much of a given as beating a legless sloth in a race.  Those days are gone but that doesn’t mean Tech should accept being Baylor’s doormat.  Matt Wells needs to take down the most despicable program in the conference (if not the nation) because it is no longer acceptable for the Red Raiders to be Baylor’s little brother.

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