Texas Tech football’s Joey McGuire on national signing day, game week
Texas Tech football coach Joey Mcguire addresses how staff will balance national signing day, Big 12 championship game in same week.
ARLINGTON — For many Texas Tech football fans, the next best thing to playing a high-stakes game in Lubbock is playing a high-stakes game in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex. To play twice in a month’s time at AT&T Stadium and do so with a first-round bye in the College Football Playoff, the Red Raiders will likely need to make a good showing in the Big 12 championship game.
That’s according to a longtime Cotton Bowl official.
Tech plays Brigham Young in the Big 12 championship game on Saturday, Dec. 6, at AT&T Stadium, home of the Dallas Cowboys. The stadium is also home to the Cotton Bowl, which will host a College Football Playoff quarterfinal on New Year’s Eve or New Year’s Day. Tech is No. 4 in this week’s CFP rankings.
The selection-day ranking comes out early Sunday, Dec. 7, with the bracket revealed shortly thereafter.
“I think, certainly, if Tech wins, there is a likely chance that they could end up in the Cotton Bowl if they come in at the number-three seed,” Michael Konradi, the game’s chief marketing officer, said on Saturday. If Tech beats BYU but remains the No. 4 seed in the final College Football Playoff rankings, “They’re more likely to go to the Orange Bowl,” Konradi said.
Ohio State, Indiana, and Georgia are the top three teams in the CFP ranking. Ohio State and Indiana meet Saturday in the Big Ten championship game, and Georgia plays Alabama in the Southeastern Conference title game.
“This is the last year where contract status applies to those bowl games that have contracts with conferences,” Konradi said. “This year, the Big Ten champion is guaranteed to go to the Rose Bowl. The highest-ranked champion from the Big 12 or SEC goes to the Sugar Bowl. The ACC champion would go — if it makes the playoff and is high enough — to the Orange Bowl.
“They will plug those teams in first, and then they will come back and go based on seeding. So for instance, if Georgia stays ahead of Texas Tech and Texas Tech gets up to the three seed, then presumably they would put Texas Tech in our game, the Cotton Bowl. That’s assuming Indiana — let’s say they lose to Ohio State — drops to the four seed.”
However, should the Ohio State-Indiana loser remain above Texas Tech in the final ranking, Konradi said the expectation is that either of the two Big Ten teams would be sent to the Cotton Bowl, based on their higher ranking and being closer to D-FW than to Miami, site of the Orange Bowl.
Konradi outlined a scenario in which Indiana loses the Big Ten championship by a small margin and stays above Texas Tech in the rankings.
“Then they’re going to look at geography,” Konradi said. “They’re not even going to compare the teams. They’re just going to go based on seeding, see that Indiana is the number-three seed and let’s say Tech stays at four, they will look at that and say Indiana is closer to Dallas than it is to, say, Miami and the Orange Bowl.”
Konradi said Tech’s sizable alumni base in D-FW and history with the Cotton Bowl won’t come into play.
“We have no control,” Konradi said. “No control.”
Another possibility: CFP No. 9 Alabama beats CFP No. 3 Georgia in the SEC championship game.
“Then Tech could vault up to the number-two seed,” Konradi said. “In that case, they are the highest-ranked champion from the Big 12 or SEC, so they go to the Sugar Bowl.”
If Georgia beats Alabama in the SEC championship game, a simple formula to determine where Tech starts the postseason: “If Texas Tech is ahead of (the loser between) Indiana or Ohio State, (the Red Raiders come) here. If Texas Tech is behind Indiana or Ohio State, one of them would come here.”
