Taking down the then No. 16 ranked Utah Utes on the road was enough to get Joey McGuire’s Texas Tech Red Raiders a bit more attention from the ESPN number crunching computers behind the Football Power Index.
For those who weren’t paying attention to one of the biggest Big 12 games of the season over the past weekend, the Red Raiders went into Rice-Eccles Stadium in Salt Lake City, Utah and surged past the Utes on their way to securing a 34-10 road victory.
That’s huge. It’s gotten Texas Tech some recognition from humans and also apparently ESPN’s Football Power Index is now moving the Red Raiders up a few spots. Texas Tech was previously sitting at No. 4 in the Big 12, according to the FPI rankings.
Now, Texas Tech sits at No. 2 in the conference.
ESPN FPI rankings place Texas Tech Red Raiders at No. 2 in the Big 12 following the Red Raiders’ huge win over Utah
Here’s what the rankings look like this week, according to ESPN’s FPI:
- BYU Cougars - No. 18 overall
- Texas Tech Red Raiders - No. 20 overall
- TCU Horned Frogs - No. 26 overall
- Kansas Jayhawks - No. 27 overall
- Utah Utes - No. 28 overall
- Arizona State Sun Devils - No. 29 overall
- Iowa State Cyclones - No. 35 overall
- Arizona Wildcats - No. 41 overall
- UCF Knights - No. 42 overall
- Baylor Bears - No. 45 overall
- Cincinnati Bearcats - No. 46 overall
- Houston Cougars - No. 47 overall
- Kansas State Wildcats - No. 49 overall
- Colorado Buffaloes - No. 54 overall
- West Virginia Mountaineers - No. 72 overall
- Oklahoma State Cowboys - No. 104 overall
It stinks that the Red Raiders aren’t exactly getting more respect here, but it is what it is. Texas Tech will continue to have chances to move up as they keep winning. And if the Red Raiders are capable of dismantling opponents on a very regular basis, then they’ll continue climbing up without any major issues at all.
It’s interesting to see TCU at No. 26. I suspect that the Horned Frogs will move up a bit as well. They looked really impressive against the SMU Mustangs over the weekend.
Now, at the bottom of the conference, it really looks like the Oklahoma State Cowboys need to just hit reset on that program. They are, by far, one of the worst teams in the country. Something has to change in Stillwater.