Cody Campbell's snit with the Big 12 commissioner over Texas Tech playing a home game against Houston under Friday night lights — a violation of "holy ground," as Joey McGuire put it this week — was a bit much. I mean, it's not like the Red Raiders haven't done it before. As recently as Nov. 24, 1941, in fact. A 7-0 barnburner over Hardin-Simmons.
The reason for the heresy back then was the schedule that Dell Morgan's predecessor left him. Pete Cawthon, a protege of Knute Rockne, famously would play anyone, anytime, anywhere. In 11 seasons in Lubbock, he played 40 schools in 23 states and three countries.
All he asked of his players in return was that they'd never lose.
"I dresses you like Notre Dame," he said after one loss. "I feeds you like Notre Dame.
"And you plays like Canyon Normal."
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Besides an excuse to dig up Pete Cawthon, I summon this history to make a point, which goes like this:
If you're determined to make a scene, you probably ought to back it up.
The Red Raiders did as much last year, blazing a trail for all the have-nots who never made it to the big time. Tech's story — a billionaire regents board chair and his buddies buying the Red Raiders a mansion in a blueblood neighborhood — offended folks under the impression that bluebloods got where they are without money. The Red Raiders' sin was simply doing it overnight.
Anyway, critics took delight in the fact that Tech got its comeuppance in the Orange Bowl. But if they thought the Red Raiders would simply go away quietly, they don't know Campbell.
Next thing you know, Tech is getting an injunction to allow Brendan Sorsby to play football despite a considerable history of betting on games, including his own. Before it was all resolved when Sorsby withdrew from the program, Tech's detractors had increased tenfold.
In "The Program," a four-part documentary released recently on Paramount+, McGuire tells his team, "We are the most hated team in the country. I love it. We are now the hunted."
Campbell, as is his nature, stepped it up another couple notches. Besides the scheduling fuss, he's also taken exception with Brett Yormark, the Big 12 commissioner, over the league's handling of the Sorsby saga. Thinks it could have been acquitted "much more privately."
"We're not going to forget about that," Campbell says in the documentary, "and I don't think they'll forget about it, either, when we're up by 40 and still throwing the ball in the fourth quarter.
"That's where the retribution will come."
For the record, we're still waiting on the retribution.
Even though they're 2-0, the Red Raiders, now ranked 13th, might be the most disappointing team in the Top 25. They've beaten the likes of Abilene Christian and Oregon State by a total of 34 points. In total offense, Tech ranks 72nd, uncomfortably sandwiched between Florida Atlantic and North Texas. On defense, the backbone of Tech's CFP push last year, the Red Raiders are 75th.
Will Hammond, returning from the knee injury that might have prompted Tech to go after Sorsby in the first place, has been tentative. McGuire wants him to let it rip. For that matter, Tommy Castellanos, who'd only been on campus a few weeks, replaced Hammond last week in the red zone.
McGuire spent much of Monday's presser answering questions about what's gone wrong so far. Tech has struggled in its running game (164.0 yards, tied for 74th) and can't get to opposing quarterbacks (just five sacks, or a nice night last year between David Bailey and Lee Hunter).
"It hasn't been as good as what we thought it would be," McGuire said of his running game. "A lot of it, I didn't think we played very good in the offensive line the other night. We've got to play better.
"And then, you know, part of the reason we gave up so much in the secondary is whenever you allow the quarterback to have as much time. ... We have got to create more pressure on the quarterback."
Conner Weigman and the rest of the 22nd-ranked Cougars have McGuire's full attention, not to mention respect. He went so far as to say that Houston is the best team they've played over the last two seasons "maybe minus Oregon."
He'd better hope Houston isn't as good as Oregon was in January, anyway, because Tech isn't nearly as good at this point as it was then. And that team lost by 23 points. Pete Cawthon wouldn't have taken it well, I can tell you that. And here you were probably wondering how I'd get back to my favorite subject.
After losses, the coach with the best winning percentage in Tech history — better even than the Pirate's — would sit up all night in a chair next to the dormitory wall. On the flight back from a defeat at the hands of the University of Detroit, when he gave his boys the Notre Dame lament, he concluded by saying he wished the plane would go down and take them all with it.
"Well, he's always tried to live like Rockne," one Red Raider whispered to a teammate. "Now he wants to die like him."
