Texas Tech basketball: Red Raiders hit rock bottom with loss to WVU

Wednesday night in Lubbock, the Texas Tech basketball team found itself at a place no one ever wants to be; rock bottom.  How long it stays there could be anyone’s guess.

Dropping a 76-61 decision to a West Virginia team that entered the game just 1-6 in Big 12 play itself, Mark Adams’ team showed little fight and even less skill as the Red Raiders remain the only winless team in conference action.  After jumping out to an early 15-5 lead, Tech saw its usual parade of mistakes and errors crop up and ruin any chance of ending the program’s longest losing streak since 2012.

Allowing the Mountaineers to hit 10 shots from 3-point range, Tech continued to let teams kill them from deep.  On the other hand, the home team could muster only three makes out of 15 3-point attempts.

Of course, the frustrations didn’t stop there. Outrebounded 44-27, Tech gave up 19 offensive boards as the Mountaineers were clearly the more physical and aggressive team.  What’s more, Tech sent WVU to the line 35 times as Bob Huggins’ team would make five more free throws (28) than Adams’ team would attempt.

Now, one has to wonder where the Red Raiders might find even one Big 12 win.  After all. the two most beatable conference teams, Oklahoma and West Virginia, have both already paid their annual visits to the Hub City.  Of the home games remaining, Only Oklahoma State appears to be a team that the Red Raiders might even be able to compete with given that the Cowboys also often struggle to put points on the board.

But let’s step back a moment and think about the gravity of the discussion we are having.  A program that played for a National Championship in 2019 and which has been to the Sweet 16 or beyond in three of the last four NCAA Tournaments is now hoping to manage just one win in order to prevent being shut out in conference play for the first time ever.

That’s a position that Tech hasn’t found itself in for over a decade.  To put it another way, this season is starting to get dangerously close to mirroring the worst season in the modern era of the program, the infamous Billy Gillespie season.

In 2011-12, Gillespie’s lone season in Lubbock, the Red Raiders were 8-23 overall and 1-17 in conference action.  Should Tech fail to win a Big 12 game this year, it could be argued that this season would be even more of a calamity, especially given the resources that have been poured into Tech hoops and the fact that this team opened the season ranked in the top 25.

That’s where we are friends.  Living in the same neighborhood as Gillespie, Chris Walker, or Pat Knight, three coaches who managed to put forth seasons of three conference wins or fewer.  And on Wednesday night, it appeared that the realization of this year’s free fall seemed to set in on the team.

For the first time all year, the Red Raiders were unable to contain their frustrations as both Mark Adams and Kerwin Walton were assessed technical fouls.  Then, when Pop Isaacs left the game in the second half with an ankle injury, there was simply no fight left in his comrades as one of their only offensive hopes was carried off of the court unable to put any weight on his leg.

When a team loses its will to fight before the calendar turns to February, that’s an alarming signal that something is fundamentally wrong.  The seniors on the team, Kevin Obanor, and De’Vion Harmon simply aren’t the type of players who can carry their teammates on their shoulders nor do they appear to be the vocal leaders that are needed in times of crisis such as this.

Meanwhile, the freshmen that are seeing the court simply aren’t showing any signs of marked improvement, at least not the type of improvement that would give us any reason to believe that they are going to be able to help save this sinking ship.

For Red Raider fans, it is hard to keep tuning in to each game.  That’s because a season that began with so much hope has quickly turned into a calamity that no one could have foreseen.  Now, instead of wondering what the rest of the season may hold in store, we are left wondering if, as the late, great Merle Haggard once sang, “Are the good times really over for good?”