Texas Tech football: JUCO OT picks OK State over Tech

Thursday, the Texas Tech football program missed out on an important recruiting target in JUCO offensive tackle Caleb Etienne who is headed to Oklahoma State.

Matt Wells and the Texas Tech football team will face Oklahoma State in Stillwater on Saturday.  But already, they have lost an important battle to the Cowboys this week.

Thursday, junior college offensive tackle Caleb Etienne committed to the Cowboys over the Red Raiders and other programs dealing Wells a tough loss to swallow on the recruiting trail.  Now, Tech will have to turn to other options to improve an offensive line that has been one of the team’s most glaring weaknesses this year.

Etienne, a 6-foot-9, 340-pound prospect from Butler Community College is the no. 2 JUCO tackle in the nation and the No. 28 overall JUCO prospect.  He would have been a walk-in starter for the Red Raiders next year but now, he’ll be facing them as a member of Mike Gundy’s program.

Back in 2018, Etienne committed to Ole Miss out of high school but he wound up going to the JUCO route, presumably because of grades.  Now that he’s headed to Stillwater, the Red Raiders are still left searching for answers at a position of need.

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The unavoidable truth is that offensive tackle has been one of this year’s greatest weaknesses for the Red Raiders.  JUCO signee Ethan Carde played so poorly that he recently lost his starting job to true freshman Caleb Rogers and Wofford transfer Josh Burger has been sub-par at left tackle as he has transitioned from a triple-option attack to a spread passing scheme.

Though all three of the tackles to have manned the two spots on the end of the line this year will be back next season, Tech needs an upgrade.  Thus, it seems likely that the transfer portal will be where Wells turns once again.

Currently, the Red Raiders do have commits from a pair of 3-star tackles in Jack Tucker from Argyle, Texas, and Jacoby Jackson from Mansfield, Texas.  However, neither are expected to be ready to man starting spots in their first year on campus.

Perhaps 2020 signee Larry Moore could challenge for a spot.  He’s impressed during his time on campus this fall but he has not cracked the two-deep rotation.  Still, another year of development in the weight room could see him be physically more capable of competing for playing time next fall.

This year, Tech has seen its line struggle more and more in pass protection as the season has progressed.  In the last three games, the Red Raiders have allowed nine sacks.  That included five against TCU.

Until the Red Raiders are more competitive along the offensive line, they are going to struggle to put forth the type of offensive excellence that we have come to expect from this program.  We had hopes that Etienne would be part of that solution but now that he isn’t, Wells and Co. still have some serious work to do in reinforcing the offensive line.