Following the controversial and messy end to the Mike Leach era, the Texas Tech Red Raiders made the decision to go out and hire Tommy Tuberville, which was certainly a decision indeed. Leach had laid the groundwork for an incredible offense and left behind a roster ready to run the Air Raid, so Texas Tech continued rolling with what they were provided with.
And for the most part, Tuberville’s first season provided Texas Tech fans with plenty of touchdowns and points to enjoy, even if it wasn’t led by Leach. Still, even with a productive offense that would make many schools jealous, the Red Raiders weren’t phenomenal on that side of the ball.
And when you factor in some sloppy defense, then it gets kind of hard to win. We’ll get a little more into the defense from the 2010 season on another day. For now, let’s focus on how the offense was okay, but still not what Texas Tech fans had grown accustomed to.
Texas Tech football history: The Red Raiders had a productive offense in 2010, but things probably could have been better in big games
Averaging 460.2 yards per game? Well, that’s good.
That’ll make most fanbases happy. It’s not the most explosive yardage total ever, and it’s really not that far of a drop off from what Tech put up in Leach’s final season with the Red Raiders. Still, it is a noteworthy decline from what Texas Tech fans got to see from the Red Raiders under Leach in 2007 and 2008 as TTU put up 529.6 and 531 total yards of offense per game respectively.
Taylor Potts was productive at quarterback, completing 67 percent of his passes for 3726 yards and 35 touchdowns against 10 picks. That’s not bad.
Texas Tech didn’t have a receiver get to 1000 yards and there weren’t any running backs breaking the 1000 yard mark on the ground. However, Detron Lewis did catch 87 passes for 852 yards while Baron Batch averaged 4.6 yards per carry on the way to getting 816 rushing yards.
Again, that’s not bad at all. It just wasn’t quite the same as what Texas Tech fans had grown used to. And in the five losses that Texas Tech suffered in 2010, the Red Raiders averaged 20.6 points per game. Against ranked teams, Texas Tech averaged 15.5 points per game. So maybe that influenced a bit of perception here.