There should be absolutely, positively zero question as to whether or not Joey McGuire and the Texas Tech Red Raiders will come out on top of their week one matchup in 2025.
ZERO question. I mean it with all sincerity when I say that there’s no reason for anyone to doubt that this Texas Tech team is capable of beating the Arkansas-Pine Bluff Golden Lions (great name, by the way).
Zero reason for doubt. Other than the fact that Texas Tech managed to really and truly struggle with the likes of Abilene Christian last year to start the season, that is. I mean, throw that game out the window and there’s never been any sort of instance ever of the Red Raiders struggling against teams that Texas Tech should beat.
But look, back to the Golden Lions and their upcoming season opener against Texas Tech. There’s no reason to doubt Texas Tech’s ability to win this game. And this isn’t just my opinion. There’s some high quality number crunching going on to back this up.
ESPN FPI projections heavily favor the Red Raiders in the first Texas Tech football game of the 2025 season
If you happen to check out the ESPN Analytics Matchup Predictor for this game, you’ll notice that the Red Raiders are being given exactly a 99 percent chance of winning this game at the moment. 99 percent! That’s a really high percent. It basically doesn’t get much better than that!
That’s a pretty good spot for McGuire and the Red Raiders to be in right now. And there’s a chance that number will change between now and kickoff, but there’s no reason for it to change to a point where we see this game being in doubt.
I fully expect to see that matchup prediction machine (which is powered by ESPN Analytics and the ESPN FPI magical math) to continue to have the Red Raiders just shy of 100 percent in these sorts of projections for this specific game.