{"id":84651,"date":"2026-01-01T16:20:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-01T21:20:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/?p=84651"},"modified":"2026-01-01T16:20:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-01T21:20:12","slug":"texas-tech-historic-season-ends-juiceless-in-orange-bowl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/2026\/01\/01\/texas-tech-historic-season-ends-juiceless-in-orange-bowl\/","title":{"rendered":"Texas Tech Historic Season Ends Juiceless In Orange Bowl"},"content":{"rendered":"

Joey McGuire elevated the Texas Tech program to previously unachieved heights. The Red Raiders\u2019 first-every Big 12 championship<\/a> made its way to the vacant spot in their trophy case. All of the off-season investment in the transfer portal paid off in a first-round bye in the college football playoff. But the Texas Tech historic season ended in Miami. Oregon\u2019s elite-skill talent and deeper talent across the board showed up on Saturday in the Orange Bowl as the Red Raiders fell by the score 23-0.<\/p>\n

Defense Played Its Best Game Of The Season<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Both Oregon and Texas Tech entered the Orange Bowl with elite defenses<\/a>. Dan Lanning and Joey McGuire couldn\u2019t have asked for more out of their respective units. This Texas Tech historic season has been fueled by a defense headlined by the award-winning linebacker<\/a> Jacob Rodriguez<\/a>. Rodriguez and ball-magnet linebacker Ben Roberts<\/a>, who finished with an interception, both walked off the field in Miami, registering double-digit tackles against the best offense they have seen all year. Future first-round pick David Bailey<\/a> was all over the field with two pass deflections and two tackles for loss.<\/p>\n

The Ducks came in with one of the most explosive offenses in the country. Texas Tech did an excellent job of preventing the big play all game. Additionally, the Red Raiders, who were on the field for more than 16 minutes of game play compared to the Ducks, made fourth-down stops to keep the game in reach. Oregon was only three-for-seven on fourth down. One of which was a fake punt that Texas Tech kept Oregon from scoring on. The difference was Oregon quarterback Dante Moore\u2019s<\/a> play-making ability. On multiple occasions throughout the game, Moore displayed high-level accuracy, delivering key third-down passes into the smallest of windows. Oregon finished the day with only 309 yards of total offense, but never made the critical mistake. Their one turnover was on fourth down in Texas Tech territory.<\/p>\n

Offenses Don\u2019t Look More Lost Than This <\/strong><\/h3>\n

This Texas Tech historic season can only hope the history books forget about this offensive performance. The Red Raiders did not struggle to score points or move the ball this year. However, they ran up against a defense that had more elite talent across the board that neutralized any offense the Red Raiders tried to run. Some will try to make an excuse that the extra time off was the case. But that was not the case today. After the first quarter, Texas Tech had run six plays for -2 yards. Quarterback Behren Morton<\/a>, who deserves his flowers for this Texas Tech career, came up short all day. For the entire first half of the game, Morton looked as comfortable as a true freshman making their college football debut. He had trouble completing check-downs to the running backs.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t until late in the third quarter that he started to look comfortable just standing in the pocket. But his accuracy remained inconsistent. Some of that is certainly directly responsible as a result of the Oregon defense. The Ducks never had to blitz to cause pressure, so Morton never could find open receivers. He finished the game with 18-for-32 for just 137 yards and two interceptions. The rushing game was never able to provide any relief either. With the exception of a 50-yard run by J\u2019Koby Williams<\/a> early in the second quarter, Texas Tech only had 19 rushing yards on 28 attempts.<\/p>\n

Playoff Loss Won\u2019t Dampen Texas Tech’s Historic Season<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Losing is never fun. In the playoffs, no one tries to brace for the season ending without lifting a trophy. For the Red Raiders, anyone watching this game saw a defense that is as good as any unit in college football. The tackling of this unit made Oregon grind out every single yard in the Orange Bowl. Limiting Oregon to 16 points (while the game was still in doubt) is as good an outcome as anyone could have imagined against this talented Duck offense.<\/p>\n

However, the offense is going to have nightmares about this performance. This result highlights that Texas Tech is ready for the top-10 spotlight. But they need to find another 3\/4\/5 elite-level players on offense if Texas Tech is going to compete for a national championship in the future. But that is a conversation for the off-season. The 2025 season is an overwhelming success. Given how this Texas Tech program has been building, they are built for future success. This season has the potential to be the catalyst for a dynastic-type run for the Red Raiders. Texas Tech has plenty to be proud of, and a loss to a potential national champion-caliber team can\u2019t dampen the 2025 season in Lubbock.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Joey McGuire elevated the Texas Tech program to previously unachieved heights. The Red Raiders\u2019 first-every Big 12 championship made its way to the vacant spot in their trophy case. All of the off-season investment in the transfer portal paid off in a first-round bye in the college football playoff. But the Texas Tech historic season […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3959,"featured_media":84660,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"1","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6,5,7361,2,17,35602,35658],"tags":[40,1275],"class_list":["post-84651","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-big12","category-bigten","category-bowl-games","category-featured","category-news","category-oregon-ducks","category-texas-tech-red-raiders","tag-college-football-playoff","tag-orange-bowl"],"modified_by":"Tony Siracusa, CFB Managing Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84651","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3959"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=84651"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84651\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":84661,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84651\/revisions\/84661"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/84660"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=84651"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=84651"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=84651"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}