Texas Tech’s summer was packed with news across football, basketball, softball, and recruiting, even if plenty of fans were busy checking out for vacation season.
On the basketball side, Texas Tech appears to have added senior forward Jamichael Stillwell from UCF. The Red Raiders also had their 2026-27 non-conference schedule take shape, with games lined up against Jackson State, Illinois, New Orleans, and Omaha. That slate also includes the Players Era 16 tournament in Las Vegas, where Texas Tech will open against Louisville.
There was also good news at the ticket office. According to reports, Texas Tech has sold out its public season tickets for men’s basketball for an eighth straight season.
The Red Raiders also showed up in the Big 12’s award conversation. Texas Tech’s nominees for the conference’s Athlete of the Year awards are football star Jacob Rodriguez and softball star Nijaree Canady.
Football, though, brought the most noise. Texas Tech drew national attention because of a major betting scandal involving quarterback Brendan Sorsby. An NCAA appeal over Sorsby’s eligibility was pushed back until February 2027, after the College Football Playoff, in early June.
Sorsby had hoped to get a shot at the NFL through a supplemental draft, but that door closed in late June when the NFL said there would be no supplemental draft in 2026. That left him ineligible for the NFL this season. Once the off-field situation settled down, reports began pointing to Will Hammond as the favorite to take over as Texas Tech’s Week 1 starter, and he was recently named the starter for the season opener.
Texas Tech also made headlines through the voice of top booster Cody Campbell, who said Big 12 athletic departments should adopt Texas Tech’s fundraising model and discussed why Texas Tech might want to leave the Big 12. Elsewhere, multiple stories examined where Texas Tech stacks up nationally in academic rankings and acceptance rates compared with other Texas and Big 12 schools.
In basketball, former Texas Tech guard Christian Anderson drew attention at the NBA Combine before becoming just the fourth first-round NBA Draft pick in Texas Tech history.
Softball kept its own spotlight, too. Texas Tech renewed its rivalry with Texas when the teams met in the WCWS championship series. After that run, the softball program added two new assistant coaches to its technical staff in late July.
Recruiting delivered plenty of momentum as well. Texas Tech landed a top 2027 prospect who had been expected to follow his two older brothers to Michigan State. The Red Raiders also picked up commitments from defensive linemen Khyren Haywood of Denton Guyer and Jalen Brewster, along with four-star safety Kaston Lewis, pushing the 2027 class into the top-20 nationally by the middle of June.
In Other News...
Joey McGuire Just Raised The Stakes For Texas Techs Offensive Depth
Texas Techs preseason practices have offered Joey McGuire a chance to look back at how much injuries shaped the 2023 season, and the coach sounds eager to see a different kind of roster this fall. He said the current group is bigger and deeper than what he has had before, with the offensive line showing encouraging progress and the staff working to build more stability across the offense.
McGuire also wants to spread the load at receiver, leaning into a more deliberate rotation rather than asking the same handful of players to carry everything. At running back, the competition is getting another layer of intrigue with Quinten Joyner back in the mix after missing time, giving Texas Tech a healthier picture of what its offense could look like when the games start to matter. [Read more 🡒]
Texas Techs Offseason Series Now Carries One Awkward Storyline
Paramount+ is following Texas Techs football offseason with a four-episode docuseries built around Joey McGuires push to reshape the programs identity. Cameras have been rolling since January, giving the project a front-row seat to a spring and summer that were supposed to be about laying groundwork for the next step in Lubbock, with the series expected to arrive before the new college football season.
But the production also has a difficult subplot baked into it, one that turned an offseason showcase into something more complicated. The show is set to touch on the off-field issues involving quarterback Brendan Sorsby, and because the cameras have been around for months, the resulting story line is likely to sit alongside the larger portrait of a team trying to move forward while dealing with an awkward chapter it could hardly have planned for. [Read more 🡒]