The Texas Tech Red Raiders are no stranger to receiving mass amounts of offseason hype heading into a new season of college football, and it appears the 2025 season will be no different.
Texas Tech was recently listed by 247Sports’ Cameron Salerno as a dark-horse team to reach the College Football Playoff, sparking the hype train once again in Lubbock.
“The Red Raiders are going to enter 2025 as the favorite in the Big 12,” Salerno wrote. “There’s really no question about that following a transfer portal binge that has them ranked second nationally in the 2025 Transfer Football Team Rankings. Texas Tech already returned a fourth-year starter at quarterback, three O-line starters, and a pair of impact receivers. Throw in all of the transfer adds, a new defensive coordinator, and several notable reinforcements on offense — not to mention high school development wins that are coming up via top-30 classes in 2023 and 2024 — and the Red Raiders will be, at least on paper, the most talented team in the Big 12. The schedule is very approachable, too, given the Red Raiders don’t face a Power Four opponent in the non-conference portion of the schedule.”
Texas Tech has done outstanding work in the transfer portal this fall with the nation’s third-ranked portal class, trailing just LSU and Ole Miss. The Red Raiders have added a total of 17 different prospects in the portal, seven of which received four-star grades and the other ten listed at three stars.
The idea of Texas Tech outright being favored to win the Big 12 Conference feels a little bit premature, however, as Arizona State returns nearly their entire offense outside of Cam Skattebo, in addition to an impressive portal class of their own.
Texas Tech will likely be one of the league’s top five teams in 2025, at least in terms of the Big 12 Preseason Media Poll. For now, the hype will have to carry over into a long offseason.
