Well, the Texas Tech Red Raiders didn’t have their leading scorer or rebounder, but that wasn’t an issue at all for Grant McCasland and his Texas Tech basketball team. The Red Raiders proved they didn’t need JT Toppin to go out and beat the Akron Zips, a foe they managed to completely and totally dismantle to get the 2026 NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament started.
To be completely honest, given the way the Akron Zips have been playing for much of the year and the sort of stats that they were putting up, I assumed that they’d be able to challenge Texas Tech in this matchup. Thankfully, the Red Raiders didn’t have an issue when facing the 12-seeded Akron.
And I mean, there was an offensive explosion. Akron’s defense wasn’t able to do anything to slow Texas Tech in any meaningful way. The Red Raiders made an astonishing 64.2 percent of their shots from the field and 55 percent of their three point attempts.
That’s insane.
Texas Tech absolutely crushes Akron as the Red Raiders rush past the Zips with a 91-71 win in the NCAA Tournament opening round
What makes those shooting stats even better is the fact that Texas Tech managed to make 57.7 percent of its shots in the first half, which is really solid. But somehow, the Red Raiders got ridiculously better and made 70.4 percent of their shots in the second half.
The Zips had a considerably worse time trying to get points on the board. Tavari Johnson managed to get just four points, which is far from ideal in general, but is certainly even more noteworthy when you factor in that he was scoring over 20 points per game prior to this.
The Red Raiders were able to lock down Akron’s three point shooting and held the Zips to just 26.3 percent shooting from behind the three point line.
Now, with this 20-point win to get the NCAA Tournament started, Texas Tech fans should feel encouraged to see that McCasland and the Red Raiders were able to snap their losing streak in such an impressive and dominant way. I know I certainly do.