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Is UT scared to keep alive its Texas Tech football rivalry? | Williams
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- Is UT scared to keep alive its Texas Tech football rivalry? | Williams
A bunch of entertaining football games are coming up, as always, the week of Thanksgiving. Many will factor into conference races, but not all.
You have Georgia- Georgia Tech , Florida-Florida State, South Carolina -Clemson, Kentucky - Louisville , all non-conference games scheduled at the end of the regular season.
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Maybe someday in the not-too-distant future, you can add Texas Tech football playing Texas to the list of rivalry games between non-conference opponents. All it would take is for the Longhorns to lose a little hubris. UT athletics director Chris Del Conte told the Avalanche-Journal last year he's OK with playing non-conference games against other Texas schools.
What he meant was, he's OK with playing other Texas schools the Longhorns don't perceive as a threat. They've played Rice three times in recent years, and they have UT-El Paso and UT-San Antonio scheduled in alternating seasons out through 2031.
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UT leads the series with Tech 54-18. Not that risky a proposition for the burnt orange, right?
The Red Raiders won last year's game, though. And when the Texas A&M-Texas series went dormant a decade ago, Tech athletics director Kirby Hocutt eagerly obliged Texas' wish to keep playing an annual Thanksgiving game. The Red Raiders, playing Texas in Austin on Thanksgiving or the day after in 2013, 2015, 2017 and 2019, took advantage of high-visibility TV windows and won two of those games.
That's all it takes for Texas to not want to play the Red Raiders any longer than they have to.
Texas Tech officials have made it clear they'll put the Red Raiders up against the Longhorns as non-conference opponents any time, any place, the sooner, the better.
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The Tech-Texas game this coming Friday night will be the last between the two football programs for the foreseeable future with Texas heading off to the Southeastern Conference at the end of the school year.
As the epicenter of college football increasingly narrows to the geography of the SEC and the Big Ten, the Red Raiders need the annual game against UT to drive visibility, the attractiveness of the schedule, ticket sales, credibility in the major polls and recruiting boosts.
Not only games against UT. We've focused on Tech's desire to continuing playing the Longhorns, but playing Texas A&M every year would be even better. Renewing that series, with its evenness, with all its close games and fantastic finishes, would be just as meaningful.
Back to the Tech-Texas discussion, though. In days gone by, universities would serve up games most attractive to their fans, without regard to the potential danger of losing. In some places, they still do, as we noted at the top.
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South Carolina and Clemson have faced each other continuously since 1909, as non-conference opponents since 1971. Georgia and Georgia Tech have played continuously since 1925, as non-conference opponents since 1964.
Florida and Florida State have squared off every year since 1958, all in non-conference. Kentucky and Louisville have met each year since 1994, also all as non-conference foes.
Each of the above series, during the time frames mentioned, was interrupted only by the COVID-19 outbreak in 2020.
Virginia and Virginia Tech have played Atlantic Coast Conference games since 2004, but their many meetings between 1937 and 2003 were as non-conference opponents. Texas A&M and LSU have met 57 times, 45 as non-conference rivals. West Virginia and Penn State have met 60 times, not once in a conference game.
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It's clear in that context there's nothing to keep Texas or Texas A&M from playing li'l ol' Texas Tech.
It'd be good for the programs, good for the fans and good for UT brass to come down off their high horse.
This article originally appeared on Lubbock Avalanche-Journal: Is UT scared to keep alive its Texas Tech football rivalry? | Williams
