Joey McGuire has transformed Texas Tech into a Big 12 power, and after a 12-win championship season, expectations in Lubbock have reached another level.
Texas Tech football isn’t sneaking up on anybody anymore.
After Joey McGuire led the Red Raiders to a 12-2 record, an 8-1 Big 12 mark and a conference championship in 2025, Texas Tech enters 2026 looking less like a fun outsider and more like a program expecting to stay among college football’s heavyweights.
That transformation is starting to change how McGuire himself is viewed nationally.
Chris Vannini of The Athletic placed McGuire in his “consistency with upside” coaching tier entering the season, a two-tier jump from where he ranked a year ago.
“Joey McGuire jumps two tiers after Texas Tech’s first conference title in decades,” Vannini wrote.
And while Texas Tech’s increased financial commitment to building the roster is impossible to ignore, winning still has to follow the spending.
Under McGuire, it has.
Vannini also pointed to something that gets overshadowed by last season’s championship: McGuire had already produced three consecutive winning seasons before the Red Raiders broke through in 2025.
“Teams with resources also have to clear a higher bar, and Tech beat every Big 12 opponent by double-digits last season,” Vannini wrote.
That’s the part that should have the rest of the Big 12 paying attention.
Texas Tech didn’t simply survive its conference schedule. It controlled it.
Now McGuire has another roster capable of making noise.
Quarterback Will Hammond takes over an offense surrounded by intriguing talent, including Cameron Dickey, Quinten Joyner, J'Koby Williams, Kenny Johnson, Malcolm Simmons and Terrance Carter Jr.
The Red Raiders have invested heavily in giving Hammond enough weapons and protection to keep the offense dangerous.
The first test comes Sept. 5 against Abilene Christian.
Nobody will confuse that matchup with the biggest game on Texas Tech’s schedule, but the expectations surrounding it tell the larger story. A few years ago, the Red Raiders were trying to establish credibility under McGuire.
Now anything short of dominating games they’re supposed to win will raise questions.
That’s what happens when a program levels up.
McGuire has already delivered Texas Tech its first Big 12 championship in decades. The next challenge is harder: proving 2025 wasn’t the peak.
If the Red Raiders contend for another conference title and push toward the College Football Playoff, McGuire won’t just keep climbing coaching rankings.
He’ll have a legitimate argument for being among the best coaches in college football.
