Texas Tech football: Red Raiders will host Houston Baptist to open 2020 season
The Texas Tech football program has officially announced Houston Baptist as the opponent in the 2020 season opener, the only non-conference game of the year.
Texas Tech football fans hoping for an intriguing non-conference game will have to wait until 2021. That’s because, on Thursday, the Red Raiders officially announced that Houston Baptist of the FCS will be the opponent in this year’s season opener, a move that had been rumored for at least two weeks.
When the 2020 schedule had to be reworked due to the COVID-19 outbreak, many Red Raider fans were in hopes that Tech would bring in an independent program such as BYU, New Mexico, or Army to be the opponent in the one non-conference game allowed by the Big 12. At worst, most were hoping for a Group of 5 program such as UTEP (against who Tech was originally supposed to open 2020 in El Paso).
Instead, we get another matchup against an FCS weakling. It will be the latest in the yearly tradition of sacrificing one sacred game per year for the sake of playing an opponent that should offer less resistance than truck stop toilet paper.
In fact, the last time the Red Raiders did not play an FCS team was in 2004. Since then, Tech has had one game per year against a program from the second tier of NCAA football and all but three of those games have been decided by at least three scores.
"“While we are disappointed we aren’t able to play a full 12-game schedule, we are looking forward to hosting Houston Baptist and five Big 12 games at home this season,” Director of Athletics Kirby Hocutt said. “We are close to finalizing our seating plans for Jones AT&T Stadium and should be sharing those details with our fans soon.”More from Wreck'Em RedTexas Tech football: Red Raider fans need to know about these MountaineersTexas Tech football: Red Raiders land first commit for class of 2025Texas Tech football: Why have the Red Raiders struggled on the road under McGuire?Texas Tech football: Why the Red Raiders can compete for a Big 12 titleTexas Tech football: Plenty of questions remain as conference play arrives"
The Huskies are coming off a 5-7 season in 2019 that saw them fall to UTEP, which Tech defeated 38-3 in Lubbock. They were the Miners’ lone victory of the season. Amazingly though, those five wins represented the most in the history of Houston Baptist football. (Granted, the program has been around since only 2013).
While this opponent is about as exciting as a lecture in the Texas Tech math building, there are some benefits to opening the year against an opponent with less bite than a teddy bear. First of all, this will be a no-pressure opportunity for players such as QB Alan Bowman, RG Jack Anderson, WR Seth Collins, and DE Erik Ezukanma to work their way back from injuries that cost them most of, if not all of 2019.
It also provides Tech with what should be a guaranteed win. And given that the rest of this season’s games will be against Big 12 opponents, any gimme is one worth taking.
This would also be an opportunity for Tech to work on some fine-tuning prior to the start of Big 12 play, which is currently set to open against Iowa State. And given that Tech was just 4-8 a season ago, all the fine-tuning the Red Raiders can get in week one should be considered a blessing.
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Still, this opponent isn’t going to excite anyone. Tech has won 19-straight games against FCS opponents and there’s no reason to believe that Houston Baptist will end that streak. But it is a Texas Tech football game for us to watch and analyze and in 2020, we can’t take such privileges for granted.