The goal of every team in any sport is to win a championship of some kind. College sports are a bit unique because they allow multiple teams to call themselves champions simply by winning a conference title.
For some programs, winning the league is just a stepping stone toward a greater goal. But for programs like Texas Tech, capturing a confernece crown is something to be celebrated. That's because this program hasn't managed to accomplish that feat very often.
In all, Tech has won just 11 conference titles in nearly 100 years of football. However, nine of those titles came in the defunct Border Conference when Tech was in a league with teams such as Arizona, Arizona State, UTEP, West Texas A&M, New Mexico, New Mexico State, Northern Arizona, and Hardin Simmons. In other words, it wasn't a major accomplishment to win that league.
In 1957 Texas Tech left the Border Conference to join the Southwest Conference. That saw the program take a major step up in competition and as a result, the league titles became rare in Lubbock. In fact, Tech never won the SWC outright. The Red Raiders were co-champions in both 1976 and 1994.
Thus, this is the 30-year anniversary of Tech's last conference title (the closest the Red Raiders have ever come to winning the Big 12 was in 2008 when they finished in a three-way tie with Oklahoma and Texas for the South Division title). So let's reminisce about what life was like when the Red Raiders last won a conference championship. Here's what life looked like in 1994.
Texas Tech's 1994 team went to the Cotton Bowl on a technicality
1994 was a strange season for the SWC. The team with the best conference record (6-0-1) was actually Texas A&M but the Aggies were on probation and ineligible for the conference crown.
Behind them, five schools, (Tech, Texas, TCU, Rice, and Baylor) all finished with 4-3 records in league play. Thus, there was a five-way tie for the SWC Championship. Back when there was no conference title game, the honor of playing in the Cotton Bowl went to the team that had been the longest without appearing in that prestigious event, Texas Tech, which hadn't played in the Cotton Bowl since 1938.
That year, the Red Raiders finished the regular season just 6-5. However, much of that was due to a brutal non-conference schedule that saw Spike Dykes' team host No. 1 Nebraska and play at No. 21 Oklahoma.
Of course, in the 1995 Cotton Bowl, things did not go well as Zach Thomas and his teammates ran into a buzzsaw in No. 21 USC, a team that featured the best wide receiver in the nation, Keyshawn Johnson. In the 55-14 defeat, the most memorable moment for Texas Tech fans was the opening kickoff when so many tortillas covered the field that the game had to be temporally halted for clean-up.
What was life like in 1994?
In the second year of the Bill Clinton administration as President of the United States, the internet was becoming more common in 1994 with the so-called "dot-com" bubble inflating the economy. Still, prices of goods were remarkably low compared to today.
For instance, a dozen fresh eggs were only $0.86. Similarly, a 1/2 gallon of milk cost just $1.44. Also, you could buy a gallon of gas for $1.11.
In the sports world, the biggest story actually revolved around figure skating. Ahead of the 1994 Winter Olympics, American Nancy Kerrigan was physically attacked at the U.S. Olympic Trials. It was soon learned that the act was part of a plan hatched by her rival skater, Tonya Harding.
Another huge story was that the FIFA World Cup in soccer was held in the United States for the first time. Though the U.S. surpassed expectations, it was Brazil that took home the title that year.
The largest story in the country, if not the world that year though, was the arrest of former N.F.L. running back O.J. Simpson. Charged with the murder of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown-Simpson, and her friend Ron Goldman, Simpson was involved in a televised low-speed chase with Los Angeles police as he traveled in the back of a white Ford Bronco down the interstate.
Another massive story from the sports world was the 1994 baseball strike. For the first time, the World Series was canceled due to labor disagreements between the players union and the owners.
Outside of the sports world, there was plenty going on. For instance, Netscape introduced "Navigator" the first commercially successful internet browser.
Gamers had a big year in 1994 with the launch of Sony's "Play Station" console. It would revolutionze the video gaming industry.
Movies that created a stir at the box office included "The Lion King", "The Shawshank Redemption", "Forrest Gump", and "Pulp Fiction". On television, a new sitcom called "Friends" debuted and took the nation by storm.
In music, the world was rocked by the suicide of Nirvana lead singer Kurt Cobain. Meanwhile, "Woodstock 1994" tried to replicate the magic of the original Woodstock music festival from 1969.
On the darker side of culture, convicted serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer was murdered while serving his prison sentence in Wisconsin. He was convicted of his crimes in 1991.
Meanwhile, the largest company in the world in 2024, Amazon, was founded in 1994. Also, in April of that year, South Africa had its first-ever free elections allowing people of all races to vote.
As you can see, 1994 was a fascinating year and it culminated with a Texas Tech football conference title. Here's hoping that 30 years later, history will repeat itself this fall, at least as far as the Red Raiders are concerned.