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Texas Tech football looking like a force again in the transfer portal
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- Texas Tech football looking like a force again in the transfer portal
Around this time last year, I compared Joey McGuire to a kid turned loose in a candy store with a $50 bill. The Texas Tech football coach, having said he expected to take 10 or 12 pieces from the NCAA transfer portal, wound up with 22.
Given the chance, he couldn't help but try all the lollipop flavors available. McGuire and his team wound up licking the rest of the Big 12 this season.
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The transfer portal's open again, doing a booming business and, to no one's surprise, Texas Tech is right in the middle of it, just like last year. Already, GM James Blanchard and company landed linebacker Austin Romaine from Kansas State , quarterback Brendan Sorsby from Cincinnati — both second-team all-Big 12 this season — and edge rusher Trey White from San Diego State, twice first-team all-Mountain West after racking up 19 1/2 sacks the past two years. The portal's top-ranked defensive tackle, Mateen Ibirogba from Wake Forest, committed to the Red Raiders , too.
Of course, they're not stopping there.
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The Red Raiders, their donors willing and able to spend big, are viewed nationally as the LA Dodgers or the New York Yankees of college football. Major free agent available? Surely, the Red Raiders are in on him if they want him. Put Texas Tech on the list of likely destinations for any top college football player on the move.
So you have on the list of players linked to Tech five-star wide receiver Cam Coleman from Auburn, playmaking young safety Koi Perich from Minnesota and Big 12 defensive freshman of the year Wendell Gregory from Oklahoma State. Sorsby, Coleman, Ibirogba and Perich are among the top dozen prospects on the 247Sports rankings of portal players available.
A few weeks ago, we asked McGuire for another pre-portal estimate of how many players he expected the Red Raiders to go after this winter. His answer was seven to 10, and the Red Raiders could go beyond that by the time you read this. Last year, I feel like McGuire, the Texas Tech personnel department and The Matador Club decided midstream to go for it maybe even more than originally planned.
Jan 1, 2026; Miami Gardens, FL, USA; The Texas Tech Red Raiders take the field prior to the 2025 Orange Bowl and quarterfinal game of the College Football Playoff against the Oregon Ducks at Hard Rock Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Sam Navarro-Imagn Images
This year, with it looking more and more like the Red Raiders will wind up in the teens on portal acquisitions, part of the reason why might be different — as in, they didn't expect so many spots to open up on the roster.
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While excitement's building for players coming into the program, the guess here is the Red Raiders are losing some players they didn't expect to lose, don't want to lose or both. As I write this, 18 players from the 2025 Tech roster have their names in the portal , and 11 were scholarship signees from the 2023, 2024 or 2025 classes.
At best, that's a lot of time invested in player development with little in return. At worst, the Red Raiders are losing players who have been in their system and in their weight room, know the ins and outs of the program and could mitigate injury issues next season. The Red Raiders didn't have to do much of that this season — 15 players started every game, and four more started at least 12. And to the extent that Cameron Dickey, J'Koby Williams, Dontae Balfour and Amier Boyd didn't have double-digit start totals, it was more about competition than injury.
Particularly hard hit this month has been C.J. Ah You's cast of edge defenders. You knew David Bailey, Romello Height, Charles Esters III and Terrell Tilmon were running out eligibility. But Dylan Spencer, Braylon Rigsby, Cheta Ofili and Eddy Smith are running out the door. I expect the Red Raiders will rebuild that position on the top end — already have to some extent with White and Division II standout Amarie Fleming.
Right now, though, that's a lonely room with only Ansel Nedore and Charles Anderson Jr.
Receiver Bryson Jones catches a pass during Texas Tech football practice, Friday, August 8, 2025, at the Womble Football Center.
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The other position most depleted numbers-wise is receiver with the portal entries by underclassmen Kelby Valsin, T.J. West, Tyson Turner and Preztynn Harrison. (Plus, tight end Trey Jackson and a couple of upperclassmen who didn't really play.) There's a framework there with the return of Coy Eakin, Micah Hudson and a promising freshman class with Leyton Stone, Bryson Jones and Michael Dever.
They've started the rebuild there with the early portal acquisitions of Jalen Jones from Alabama State and Donte Lee from Liberty.
For the moment, at least, the Red Raiders aren't squeezed on numbers. Taking into account current players with eligibility remaining, December high-school signees and transfers already fished from the portal, Tech looks to have about seven spots open for a 105-man roster.
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Based on what we saw last year, they'll be full before we you know it. Plenty of shopping days left at the candy store, and Joey McGuire's stack of bills isn't getting any shorter.
This article originally appeared on Lubbock Avalanche-Journal: Transfer portal doing big things for Texas Tech football
