I will start this post reflecting on last year's football game between these two team. But first I want to remind readers that Nebraska leads the series 7-3 but Tech has won the previous 3 games. Tech is in the Big 12 south and Nebraska is in the Big 12 north so they do not play one another every year. Instead they usually play each other every two years for 2 consecutive years. This is how the south and north division games are scheduled so that all north teams play at least 3 south division teams each year.
Anyway about last year's game, Sara & I attended the Nebraska game in Lubbock when Tech was ranked #7. Texas Tech had to go into OT to win that game. Nebraska had lots to prove coming into this game and Tech almost floundered. Tech scored a TD in OT but failed on the extra point which would have been detrimental had the Huskers scored a TD and the extra point. Had our defensive back, Jamal Wall, not intercepted the ball, it would have been lights out for Tech. Indeed a nail-biter. Nebraska, having won 5 national championships in years past, had not been a very good football team for a long time, and I am sure it bothered them that Tech was ranked so high and doing so well coming into this game in the little ole town of Lubbock, Texas. As if Linclon was any better-whatever. The Cornhuskers came into that game cocky and with bad attitudes as their fans showed us before the game even started. The Huskers had already decided to snub their little brother (Tech) who was in the Big 12 south division when the Big 12 was enacted in 1995. They had surely long ago decided that only OU & UT would be deserving, annual contenders to play Nebraska and not the likes of Texas Tech. That lowly Tech would never beat them because they were the Huskers - the owners of "Big Red"! They were wrong.
As this year's game saw Texas Tech march into Lincoln, our Red Raiders once again proved their "Big Red" nation wrong. Even if the Huskers were ranked #17, Tech was ready to defeat them and to remind them that past history of any collegiate football team does not guarantee any team will continue to win. The Nebraska championship teams of the past is just that...in the past. Tech has dawned a new era of players and coaches who are at the ready to beat any team, any time. The UT loss should not have been a loss. I have to let that one be as Tech has moved forward. The UH loss was a fluke and Coach Leach should have allowed the kicker to score 3 points instead of showing off thinking Tech could score 7. That decision was stupid, but Tech has also moved forward from that quirky loss so I need to do the same. At least Tech lost both games to ranked teams.
As Tech does continue to move forward after this week's win versus the Huskers, they will show everyone what they are made of and will prove that as a "systems" team as those sport's pundits (idiots) like to call them, they (Tech) will continue to be successful. Florida still has Tebow, OU still has Bradford (or did) and UT still has McCoy BUT they are struggling with every win. Yes, they are figuring out how to win, but it has been ugly and "just barely squeaking by" kinda wins. A better opponent is at the ready to beat them and it is coming soon. My point in stating those things about those 3 teams (and several other "wanna be" teams) is that they don't have the ability to "plug and play" like our Red Raiders can. Maybe it is those "non-system's" teams who are going to fall victim very soon to the gimmicky teams like Tech with the "systems" offense. Those "non-systems" teams who will soon need to change their format of play and catch up to a "systems" offense and drop "traditional" because "systems" is what present day and time is now demanding of college football.
Next week's Tech game sees the A&M Aggies travel to Lubbock. Let's see if our Red Raiders beat them as mightily as Kansas St beat the Aggies this week and as badly as Tech already beat Kansas St last week. Whew, whatta mouthful.
ANYWAY, ONWARD & UPWARD TECH...RED RAIDERS STILL RULE!
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