With how the Texas Tech football team has performed all throughout the season, it shouldn’t be a shocker that there are folks out there who might think the Red Raiders will go pretty far into the College Football Playoff system this season. I mean, Texas Tech has been absolutely dominant in each and every one of its wins.
And that’s why ESPN’s College Football Playoff projections has the Red Raiders going pretty far. Like the CFP semis.
Well, to be perfectly and totally clear, one of the ESPN College Football Playoff projections puts Joey McGuire and the Texas Tech Red Raiders in the semifinal round of the College Football Playoffs. We’ve got one projection from Kyle Bonagura that has that happening. Mark Schlabach’s projection doesn’t have the Red Raiders going that far.
Week 13 College Football Playoff projections: ESPN analyst has Texas Tech Red Raiders making it to the semifinals
It’s interesting. It seems like Shlabach and Bonagura are on the same page on Texas Tech for a while, though it does look like they differ in overall expectations of the Red Raiders at this point in the season. The first two rounds of their projections for the College Football Playoff are identical for Texas Tech.
The Red Raiders, according to their thoughts, would open up the playoffs by hosting the North Texas Mean Green (a matchup that I definitely need to see) in Lubbock and both of the ESPN college football analysts have the Red Raiders coming out on top of that one.
Then they have No. 5 Texas Tech meeting up with the No. 4 Georgia Bulldogs in the College Football Playoff quarterfinal down in the Orange Bowl. And this is where expectations differ. Bonagura has the Red Raiders moving on while Shlabach has the Bulldogs finding a way to win.
Honestly, I could certainly see either scenario and could be convinced easily of either of these teams winning.
In Bonagura’s projections, everything’s great for Texas Tech up until the Red Raiders run into the No. 1 Ohio State Buckeyes in the semifinal matchup in the Fiesta Bowl. It’s at that point that Bonagura has Texas Tech falling short.
That would stink.
Plain and simple. That’s far from ideal. That’s not what we want. But it’d be fun to see McGuire and the Red Raiders simply get that far. We’ve never really seen Texas Tech compete at this level in this way. This Texas Tech team is being considered a team that could make some very serious noise in the College Football Playoff. And maybe we’ll see the Red Raiders shock some folks.