Cotton Bowl Bound and Reality Sets In

I was born a Texas Tech Red Raider. My whole family is from the Lubbock area and I had two uncles, among many others, who pushed the Red Raider way on me. As a kid I chose most of the teams I root for, whether it’s the Oakland Raiders or The Ohio State University Buckeyes, but I came by Tech fandom honestly. So please allow me a moment to explain how hard it is to be a fan of a team that has ALMOST no chance of winning a football championship in my lifetime.

The past year was the best season in the history of Texas Tech football, at least since the school entered the South West Conference in 1960. Starting at around number 15 in most ranking polls to begin the season, Tech jumped as high as number 2 before the 65-21 crushing in Norman. It was a season marked by many incredible highs that most Tech fans could only dream of: the contention of both Graham Harrell and Michael Crabtree for the Heisman trophy; the last second defeat of the number 1 ranked team in the nation and longtime bully on the block, Texas; the national press finally acknowledging the Red Raiders as a legitimate championship contender. It was a season that was a blast to be a part of from beginning to end. And under normal circumstances, I would be more than satisfied with 11 and 1.

But this isn't a normal season.

Sunday's announcement that my Red Raiders would be taking on Ole Miss in the Cotton Bowl came as no surprise. There was perhaps a 1 percent chance that the Fiesta Bowl would choose Tech over Texas, though perhaps 1 percent is a bit high. From the moment the second quarter began in the Tech-Oklahoma game 2 weeks ago, my hopes of playing in a BCS game had all but faded away. I had convinced myself that playing in the Cotton Bowl is no laughing matter and that the steps the program took this season should still be valued. Still, when the announcement came, I couldn't help but be disappointed.

Let's get this out of the way up front: unlike some of my fellow Tech fans, I'm not going to argue that the Red Raiders necessarily should have been invited to the Fiesta Bowl instead of Texas. There's a small part of me that feels cheated in that Tech squarely defeated Texas only a short month ago and yet the Longhorns are the ones headed to Arizona. If it had been the other way around, I assure you Texas fans would be throwing a fit today. An even bigger part of me feels cheated by a ridiculous BCS system that rewards teams from lesser conferences in order to “spread the wealth.” So while Tech will take part in the best non-BCS bowl game, Cincinnati, Ohio State, and Virginia Tech, with their 8 loses between them (not to mention Penn State and Utah, both of whom Tech would crush) will all enjoy the perks of playing in major night games and approximately twelve million dollars that will be paid to each school for playing in a BCS game. Still, this system has been in place for ten years and everyone has to play by the same rules. All of this is a moot because if Tech had taken care of business and just stayed relatively close to Oklahoma they’d be preparing for the Fiesta Bowl as I write this.

I’m not writing today to complain about how unfair the BCS system is or question how Texas got into a BCS game despite the fact that Tech has the same record and also owns the tiebreaker against the Longhorns. No, today I’m more concerned with writing about what it’s like to be a Tech fan and how much reality hurts.

Fans of teams like Oklahoma, Texas, USC, Ohio State, Florida, or any other national power can’t understand what it’s like to be a fan of a program like Texas Tech. Even during down years, programs like those mentioned above always have hope of resurrection. OU was awful during the early years of the Big 12 but in the end the school’s tradition and money won out and they’ve been back in power since they hired Bob Stoops. It’s the same for places like Florida. The Gators had a couple of “bad” seasons under Ron Zook in which they still made trips to the Outback and Peach bowls then quickly reloaded with Urban Meyer and won a title a year later. Tennessee just completed a losing season and went through the process of hiring a new coach. The program is down but because of their tradition and power, in all likelihood the Volunteers will be competing for conference championships within a couple of years.

It’s not very hard to be a fan of a traditional powerhouse, and I feel like I have permission to say that considering the fact that my other college sports loves are Ohio State football and Duke basketball. It’s easy to root for a team that disappoints you when they don’t win the title. When Ohio State bombs out in the National Championship Game, despite my immense depression, I can always comfort myself with the thought that, “There’s always next year.”

There’s not such thinking about next year when it comes to Texas Tech. This year was THE year. Their quarterback will graduate, their best player will head for the NFL, and it’s likely that Mike Leach, coach and offensive genius, will leave for would-be greener pastures. Next season it will almost certainly be back to normal, meaning the Red Raiders finish with between two and four losses, go to a decent bowl, and don’t warrant any legitimate national attention.

But the key to that last sentence is “almost.” It’s “almost” certain that Tech won’t take that step into serious contention next season. “Almost.” There is perhaps a two percent chance that next season will be the one in which the Red Raiders jump into a BCS game and championship contention. And that “almost” is the kick in the pants every single year.

The truth is, as easy as it is to be a fan of a big time program like Oklahoma or Florida, it’s also easy to be a fan of a terrible team that has zero chance of winning a title in the next ten or twenty years. Fans of Vanderbilt, Baylor, Duke, etc. can enjoy a 6-6 season and then settle back in to reality when the next year rolls around and the team goes 3-9. You always hope they start winning some games but you know going into each season that there is no way your team will win a title. As depressing as that sounds, there’s comfort in having lesser expectations, in accepting your team’s doormat status and just hoping that once a year they jump up and screw up another team’s season.

“Almost” gets me every single year for the last decade of Texas Tech football. In all honesty, maybe I shouldn’t expect the Red Raiders to ever make a BCS game. Despite turning themselves into a second-tier program (a major upgrade from where they were ten years ago), they still play third banana in the Big 12 to Oklahoma and Texas. Both of those programs have an endless supply of money to support them, boosters who can quietly sweep problems under the rug, coaches who will never leave as long as things are good, and a tradition that never dies no matter how bad things get. In recruiting alone, Tech almost always comes fourth behind Texas, OU, and the other national powers that raid the Texas high school football system each year. Maybe the Red Raiders are right where they are supposed to be, a second tier team that is always exciting and dangerous but ultimately doomed to fall short against the powers of college football. But regardless of whether or not that is my lot in life as a Tech fan, the two percent chance, the “almost,” never seems to go away.

When the 2009 season rolls around, I will almost certainly convince myself that this year could be the year. That despite losing Graham Harrell, Michael Crabtree, and Mike Leach, we’re still set up to make a run. That the collection of undersized hustlers at the skill positions and an offense that can score on just about anyone will be able to bust their way through the rankings. That perhaps they’ll get a little lucky and catch Texas and OU off guard and beat both. And at the end of the season, when Tech heads to the Gator Bowl or the Holiday Bowl or maybe even the Cotton Bowl, reality will once again set in and I’ll remember that I’m a Tech fan and Tech has ALMOST no chance of winning a national title each season.

“Almost.”