Texas Tech football: Joey McGuire shows off recruiting prowess on first day

LUBBOCK, TEXAS - OCTOBER 19: Texas Tech Red Raiders mascot Raider Red signals "Guns Up" before the college football game against the Iowa State Cyclones on October 19, 2019 at Jones AT&T Stadium in Lubbock, Texas. (Photo by John E. Moore III/Getty Images)
LUBBOCK, TEXAS - OCTOBER 19: Texas Tech Red Raiders mascot Raider Red signals "Guns Up" before the college football game against the Iowa State Cyclones on October 19, 2019 at Jones AT&T Stadium in Lubbock, Texas. (Photo by John E. Moore III/Getty Images) /
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It’s no secret that the Texas Tech football head coach search committee hired Joey McGuire in part because of his reputation as an ace recruiter. And on McGuire’s first day as a Red Raider, he showed everyone in Raiderland just how effective he is at that aspect of his job by landing three high school recruits.

By quickly securing pledges from corner Jaylon Peoples, and defensive tackles Syncere Massey and Harvey Dyson, McGuire accomplished more on the recruiting trail in one evening than Matt Wells did in the last four months.  It was an impressive show of recruiting power from McGuire, who lifted Tech’s recruiting class from last in the Big 12 to 7th before he even held his introductory press conference.

It didn’t hurt that all three of the new commits are products of Cedar Hill High School where McGuire won three state titles.  Though these players were just in middle school when McGuire left to join the Baylor staff, they all certainly know of McGuire’s reputation and they were quick to jump at the chance to play for him at Texas Tech.

Peoples is the highest-rated of the three.  A 3-star prospect, he is ranked by 247Sports as the second-best recruit in the current Texas Tech class.

The 6-foot, 175-pounder is rated the No. 43 corner in his class and the No. 60 player in Texas.  He holds offers from Baylor, Kansas, Kansas State, Washington, Arizona, Cincinnati, Colorado, Minnesota, Mississippi State, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma State, Tennessee, Ole Miss, and others.

Massey is a 6-foot-5, 280-pound defensive tackle.  Also rated a 3-star prospect, he is the No. 155 defensive lineman in the class of 2022 and the No. 166 player in Texas.  He holds offers from the likes of Arizona State, Kansas, LSU, Missouri, Central Florida, and Southern Cal.

Meanwhile, Dyson seems to be a bit of a diamond in the rough.  Rated a 3-star prospect by  247Sports, the 6-foot-3, 260-pounder is the No. 189 defensive lineman in the nation and the No. 218 player in Texas.  In addition to Tech, he reportedly has offers from Arizona, Kansas State, and SMU among others.

Entering Monday night, Texas Tech had just nine players committed to the class of 2022.  What’s more, the program had landed only two verbal commitments since July.

But now that there’s a new sheriff in town, one that prides himself on being a top-flight recruiter, business is about to pick up on that front.  And the timing couldn’t be better.

Remember that football recruits can sign their national letters of intent from December 15-17 this year.  That gives McGuire a full month to put together a recruiting class.

It’s a huge benefit to have hired a coach now and to have him in place to work on securing the 2022 class rather than to have hired a sitting head coach and to have to wait on him to finish out the current season, which ends only about two weeks prior to the opening of the signing window.

That’s why making the move to terminate Matt Wells as head coach in the middle of the season was a wise one.  It allowed AD Kirby Hocutt and the search committee to take their time in finding the new head coach but still do so in enough time to allow that coach to get a running start on putting together a recruiting class.

But of all the candidates that Tech interviewed, McGuire might have been the only one who would have been able to start immediately.  Every other candidate that we know the committee spoke to was either a current head coach or a coordinator making it harder for them to step away from their current jobs to begin work for the Red Raiders.

Also, it seems likely to assume that none of the other candidates would have been able to make as big of a recruiting splash on day one as McGuire did.  And if that’s what he can do on his first day on the job, Texas Tech fans can’t wait to find out what he can do in the long term.