With all of the wins, the conference crown, and the appearance in the College Football Playoff, the Texas Tech Red Raiders were pretty successful this past season. And with all of that success, I’m sure you’ll be shocked to learn that the Red Raiders were the best team in the Big 12 in a number of different ways.
I mean, first is the whole “Texas Tech won the Big 12” sort of angle. But there’s a few other angles that we could talk about here as well.
Such as the Red Raiders leading the way in the final Coaches Poll Top 25 college football rankings for the season. We’ve already seen this unfold with both the AP Poll and the ESPN FPI rankings, so it’s not that shocking to see Texas Tech at the top of the conference here as well.
Still, it is nice to see and to celebrate.
Joey McGuire and the Texas Tech Red Raiders take the lead among Big 12 members in the final Coaches Poll rankings of 2025-2026
Here’s what things look like for the Big 12 in the last Coaches Poll college football rankings for the 2025-2026 season:
- Texas Tech Red Raiders - No. 7 overall
- BYU Cougars - No. 12 overall
- Utah Utes - No. 14 overall
- Houston Cougars - No. 19 overall
As a whole, it seems like the folks voting on the Coaches Poll weren’t as impressed with the Big 12 as what the AP Poll voters appeared to be. Now, the rankings disparity for the various teams that are ranked really isn’t drastically different between the two sets of rankings. In the final Coaches Poll of the season, BYU is one spot lower while Houston is three spots higher.
Other than that, there’s no difference for the Big 12 teams that are ranked here. But, well, the Big 12 didn’t get a fifth team ranked. The Arizona Wildcats and the TCU Horned Frogs both ended up in the “others receiving votes” category, but they would’ve been ranked No. 30 and No. 31 respectively (which isn’t where either program wants to be).
All things considered, this set of rankings wasn’t all that bad for the Big 12, but it could have been better. But that likely has to do with the conference and the quality of teams it has and a need for improvement in that regard more than it does anything else.