Texas Tech's victory over Houston one of the best wins in university history

There will be time for statistical analysis of the Texas Tech basketball team's 82-81 win over No. 6 Houston. Now, is not that time.

Rather, it feels appropriate to simply take a moment to appreciate what the Red Raiders did on Saturday night. That's because we just witnessed one of the best wins in the history of the university regardless of the sport.

Sure, this was only a regular-season win and there is still more to play for. Thus, this win doesn't quite stack up to the Elite Eight win over Gonzaga or the Final Four win over Michigan State in 2019.

What's more, this game didn't propel the program to new heights like the College World Series appearance that the baseball program managed to accomplish for the first time in 2014. Similarly, it won't push Tech to its highest ranking in program history like the football program's win over No. 1 Texas did in 2008.

However, I have been watching Texas Tech sports since my freshman year in Lubbock over 25 years ago and I can't remember a Red Raider team overcoming more in-game adversity to beat a team as good as Houston. What's more, the Red Raiders managed to do so on the road.

Moving to 8-2 (5-0 on the road) in Big 12 play, the Red Raiders showed the nation that they are capable of beating any team in the country. And they did so while missing their best player and their head coach.

Just four minutes into the game, sophomore forward JT Toppin, who leads Tech in scoring and rebounding, was assessed a Flagrant-2 foul which comes with an automatic ejection. The call was one of the most egregiously stupid infractions that has ever been levied against a Red Raider as Toppin was guilty of nothing but accidentally kicking a Houston player in the groin area while jumping to make a pass.

Virtually every television analyst, unbiased college basketball expert on social media, and the ESPN2 broadcast crew said the ejection was unwarranted. Of course, Grant McCasland agreed because when he found out that Toppin had been kicked out of the game, the normally respectful and composed head coach went ballistic picking up two immediate technical fouls to draw his own ejection.

That left the Red Raiders even more short-handed than they were to begin the game, a contest they entered without important backup guard Kevin Overton who did not play for unspecified reasons. Thus, Tech had to turn to seldomly-used sophomore forward Eemeli Yalaho to step in and pick up the slack in the rotation.

Still, the Red Raiders managed to get the game to overtime. However, the adversity didn't end there.

In the extra five minutes, star forward Darrion Williams fouled out with 4:11 left to play. Then, big man Federiko Federiko fouled out some three minutes later. That meant that the only player over 6-foot-5 that Tech had to put on the floor to close the game was Yalaho who had not played competitive minutes in a game since December 21.

Yet, when the game was on the line, Yalaho came up with a defensive play to essentially seal the win as he stood his group against Houston's star forward, J'Wan Roberts, well enough to draw a travel from a player who was nearly unstoppable down the stretch on his way to 18 points and seven rebounds.

It was fitting that Yalaho's heroics with 1.5 seconds left was what ultimately wrapped up the win. That's because this was a team win accomplished as much by the Red Raiders' unsung heroes as their stars.

Assistant coach Jeff Linder, who has received little credit for masterminding the Red Raiders' elite offense this year, stepped into McCasland's shoes and coached the game of his life. Kerwin Walton, one of Tech's starting guards who had not scored in double figures since the first two games of the season, came up with 14 huge points, third-most on the team.

Point guard Elijah Hawkins, who had not scored more than 14 points in a game since January 14, posted 17 points, grabbed six rebounds, and dished out four assists against the best perimeter defensive team in the nation.

We could go on but the point is clear. This was a program win, one that required every member of the team to pull his weight in one way or another so that the Red Raiders could overcome blatant incompetence by the Big 12 officials and the brute force of the Houston Cougars.

Rarely do teams have what it takes to beat the Cougars on their home floor. They had won 33 games in a row in their own building.

Thus, to do so in spite of all of the breaks that went against the Red Raiders on Saturday night was borderline miraculous. We've seen a ton of big wins from the Red Raiders across all sports over the years. And given what Tech overcame in Houston, this one is going to be one that no one will soon forget.