(Bear with me. Might be a little long):
Perhaps the least surprising thing about a bit of a surprising September is tomorrow night's game is a sellout, meaning that about 61,000 fans will be at Jones Stadium for Tech-Oklahoma State.
61,000. Don't just brush by that number. Three games removed from a losing season and an up-and-down off-season, over three years from the last bowl win, Tech fans will do what they nearly always do -- come close to, or in this case, fill Jones Stadium.
It takes effort to be a Red Raider. It takes loyalty, a resilient tough skin. Draw a 100-mile radius around Lubbock and tally the fairly sparse population. Go to the files and see the last outright conference championship was in the 1950s. No school in the country draws more fans per population capita and more fans per lack of championship capita than in Lubbock, Texas.
In a rough weather region, we are not fair-weather fans. Fans in Fort Worth and Waco, even Stillwater and Austin, have cheered championships, but those fans in much more heavily populated areas bend with the times. Win and they show (sometimes), lose and they don't. For them, it's a hobby. For us, it's a way of life. West Texas and Texas Tech are not for everybody, and they don't try to be.
It may be why we're not really a T-Shirt school. West Texas is grit, not glamour. It is an acquired taste, one that takes investment of emotions, time and finances. We're seen as the little public school brother, fighting like hell to get what we deserve. In all of that, there is a bond.
Sure, we get frustrated and complain, and though we threaten to in the worst of times to leave or not care, we never really can. On this board, we get frustrated, sometimes fall in different camps of what is best for Tech and against our better angels, call each other a few choice words. But we all have two things in common -- a love for this university who gave all of us so much, and a desire to win within the rules.
And we do and have won, and at times it's glorious, and so when you find your voice cracking while singing the Matador song after the 2008 Texas game, it's almost a surprise, but it shouldn't be.
On the last night of September, Jones Stadium will be filled with third generation Tech students, middle-aged adults who as kids in the 1960s had their mother put "44" in a magic marker on his T-shirt so he could be Donny Anderson. It will be filled with adults who as kids played on the north grass while the game went on. It will be filled by those who grew up in the metroplex and in Houston, who took a leap of faith to come to school in faraway West Texas and never regretted a moment.
We will invest again, knowing there will probably be disappointment, but still believe one of these days there will not be, that the conference championship is there that other less loyal fan bases have won.
So on Saturday, we'll make our way from the Permian Basin, from the Panhandle, from the Big Country, from along I-20 from the metroplex, from the airports of Dallas, Houston, Austin and San Antonio to join the the thousands who don't have to leave the Lubbock city limits. For we know, there's no place we'd rather be on a fall Saturday night than under the lights at the Jones.
We'll see you tomorrow night.
Perhaps the least surprising thing about a bit of a surprising September is tomorrow night's game is a sellout, meaning that about 61,000 fans will be at Jones Stadium for Tech-Oklahoma State.
61,000. Don't just brush by that number. Three games removed from a losing season and an up-and-down off-season, over three years from the last bowl win, Tech fans will do what they nearly always do -- come close to, or in this case, fill Jones Stadium.
It takes effort to be a Red Raider. It takes loyalty, a resilient tough skin. Draw a 100-mile radius around Lubbock and tally the fairly sparse population. Go to the files and see the last outright conference championship was in the 1950s. No school in the country draws more fans per population capita and more fans per lack of championship capita than in Lubbock, Texas.
In a rough weather region, we are not fair-weather fans. Fans in Fort Worth and Waco, even Stillwater and Austin, have cheered championships, but those fans in much more heavily populated areas bend with the times. Win and they show (sometimes), lose and they don't. For them, it's a hobby. For us, it's a way of life. West Texas and Texas Tech are not for everybody, and they don't try to be.
It may be why we're not really a T-Shirt school. West Texas is grit, not glamour. It is an acquired taste, one that takes investment of emotions, time and finances. We're seen as the little public school brother, fighting like hell to get what we deserve. In all of that, there is a bond.
Sure, we get frustrated and complain, and though we threaten to in the worst of times to leave or not care, we never really can. On this board, we get frustrated, sometimes fall in different camps of what is best for Tech and against our better angels, call each other a few choice words. But we all have two things in common -- a love for this university who gave all of us so much, and a desire to win within the rules.
And we do and have won, and at times it's glorious, and so when you find your voice cracking while singing the Matador song after the 2008 Texas game, it's almost a surprise, but it shouldn't be.
On the last night of September, Jones Stadium will be filled with third generation Tech students, middle-aged adults who as kids in the 1960s had their mother put "44" in a magic marker on his T-shirt so he could be Donny Anderson. It will be filled with adults who as kids played on the north grass while the game went on. It will be filled by those who grew up in the metroplex and in Houston, who took a leap of faith to come to school in faraway West Texas and never regretted a moment.
We will invest again, knowing there will probably be disappointment, but still believe one of these days there will not be, that the conference championship is there that other less loyal fan bases have won.
So on Saturday, we'll make our way from the Permian Basin, from the Panhandle, from the Big Country, from along I-20 from the metroplex, from the airports of Dallas, Houston, Austin and San Antonio to join the the thousands who don't have to leave the Lubbock city limits. For we know, there's no place we'd rather be on a fall Saturday night than under the lights at the Jones.
We'll see you tomorrow night.
