The Texas Tech Red Raiders baseball team represents

Texas Tech University Texas Tech University (Texas Tech, Tech, or TTU) is a public research university in Lubbock, Texas. Established on , and called Texas Technological College until 1969, it is the main institution of the five-institution Texas Tech University Sy ...

NCAA Division I NCAA Division I (D-I) is the highest level of intercollegiate athletics sanctioned by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) in the United States, which accepts players globally. D-I schools include the major collegiate athleti ...

college baseball College baseball is baseball that is played on the intercollegiate level at institutions of higher education. In comparison to football and basketball, college competition in the United States plays a smaller role in developing professional pl ...

. The team competes in the

Big 12 Conference The Big 12 Conference is a college athletic conference headquartered in Irving, Texas, USA. It consists of ten full-member universities. It is a member of Division I of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) for all sports. Its ...

and plays at

Dan Law Field at Rip Griffin Park Dan Law Field at Rip Griffin Park, nicknamed "The Law", is the home stadium of the Texas Tech Red Raiders baseball team in Lubbock, Texas. It is located on the Texas Tech University campus, adjacent to Jones AT&T Stadium and Fuller Track. Dan L ...

. Their head coach is

Tim Tadlock Tim Tadlock (born December 21, 1968) is a collegiate baseball coach and former player. He served as head coach of the Grayson Vikings representing Grayson County College (GCC) (1997–2005) and the Texas Tech Red Raiders representing Texas Tech ...

and is entertaining his 9th season with the Red Raiders.

History

Early years

Along with the

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly ...

and men's basketball teams, the Texas Tech baseball team was founded during the university's initial academic year, in 1925–26. The team's first series was against the

West Texas A&M Buffaloes The West Texas A&M Buffaloes, also known as the WTAMU Buffaloes or WT Buffaloes, and formerly West Texas State Buffaloes and WTSU Buffaloes, are the athletic teams that represent West Texas A&M University, located in Canyon, Texas, in NCAA Divis ...

in 1926, an 18–9 victory in the first game and 14–9 loss in the second. The third game in the team's history—this one against

Daniel Baker College Daniel Baker College was founded April 5, 1889 in Brownwood, Texas, United States. It was named in memory of the Rev. Dr. Daniel Baker, a Presbyterian circuit-riding minister, who helped organize the first presbytery in Texas in 1840 and Austin ...

—ended in a 3–3 tie after 11 innings. E. Y. Freeland was the first coach of the Red Raiders, though the team was known as the Matadors at the time. He remained in the position for three years before R. Grady Higginbotham took the role. Higginbotham coached for only two years. From 1930 to 1953, Texas Tech did not field an intercollegiate baseball team.

Revival era

When the program returned in 1954,

Beattie Feathers William Beattie "Big Chief" Feathers (August 20, 1909 – March 11, 1979) was an American football player and coach of football and baseball. He played college football and college basketball at the University of Tennessee. Early life and colle ...

became the head coach of the Red Raiders and remained until 1960. He was followed by

Berl Huffman Berl Huffman (August 27, 1907 – October 16, 1990) was a college baseball, college basketball, and college football head coach. He coached at Texas Tech University and the University of New Mexico. Coaching career Baseball Huffman was the fourt ...

(1961–1967),

Kal Segrist Kal Hill Segrist (April 14, 1931 – June 26, 2015) was a utility infielder in Major League Baseball who played for the New York Yankees (1952) and Baltimore Orioles (1955). Listed at 6' 0", 180 lb., Segrist batted and threw right-handed. He ...

(1968–1983), and Gary Ashby (1984–1986). Texas Tech joined the

Southwest Conference The Southwest Conference (SWC) was an NCAA Division I college athletic conference in the United States that existed from 1914 to 1996. Composed primarily of schools from Texas, at various times the conference included schools from Oklahoma ...

in 1968, but experienced little success. During this 26 season period, the Red Raiders had only seven winning seasons; only twice finishing as high as third, with only three winning records in conference play.

Modern era

Larry Hays Larry Hays is a US college baseball, basketball, women's basketball, and softball coach. Hewas the head baseball coach at Lubbock Christian University (LCU) (1971–1986) and Texas Tech University (1987–2008). He was the head coach of the LCU Cha ...

took over the Red Raiders baseball team in 1987. Under Hays, Texas Tech endured only two losing seasons, his first and last, and enjoyed their greatest success in baseball. Hays took Texas Tech from having a losing tradition to being a national contender. When Hays started with the Red Raiders, the team's overall record stood at 550–576–5. By the time he left, he was the fourth-winningest coach in college baseball history and improved the team's record to 1,365–1,054–8. The Red Raiders reached eight straight NCAA tournaments from 1995 to 2002 and again in 2004, three of which were held at Dan Law Field at Rip Griffin Park. They also won the 1995 Southwest Conference championship, and the inaugural Big 12 Conference championship in 1997. The Hays-led Red Raiders also won the SWC Tournament in 1995, and the Big 12 Tournament in 1998. On June 2, 2008, Larry Hays announced his retirement, paving the way for assistant coach

Dan Spencer Dan Spencer (born September 10, 1965) is a college baseball coach. He currently serves as the head coach for the Linfield College Wildcats. He previously served as head coach at Green River Community College (1992–1996) and Texas Tech University ...

to take over. Spencer, a former Texas Tech player, won back-to-back national championships as an assistant head coach for the

Oregon State Beavers The Oregon State Beavers are the athletic teams that represent Oregon State University, located in Corvallis, Oregon. The Beavers compete at the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I ( Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) for ...

. In Spencer's four seasons as head coach, he led the Red Raiders to only one winning season. Prior to Spencer's fourth, and final, season as head coach,

was hired as associate head coach for the Red Raiders under Dan Spencer. The following season saw Tadlock replace Spencer as the ninth head coach of the Red Raiders following Spencer's firing. Tadlock was a starting shortstop for the Red Raiders during the 1990 and 1991 seasons. Tadlock previously led the Grayson College Vikings to back-to-back NJCAA Division I World Series championships in the team's five appearances over his 9 seasons as head coach. Tadlock's first season saw the team finish 26–30, and 8th of 9 in Big 12 play. Prior to the 2014 season, the Red Raiders were selected to finish in 8th place in the Big 12 Conference in the preseason polls. In only his second season, the Red Raiders won their first NCAA Tournament Regional Championship, defeating the Columbia Lions and host team Miami Hurricanes to advance to the program's first Super Regional appearance. The team would host

College of Charleston The College of Charleston (CofC or Charleston) is a public university in Charleston, South Carolina. Founded in 1770 and chartered in 1785, it is the oldest university in South Carolina, the 13th oldest institution of higher learning in the Unit ...

in the Lubbock Super Regional before shutting them out twice in two 1–0 games, earning the programs first berth in the

College World Series The College World Series (CWS), officially the NCAA Men's College World Series (MCWS), is an annual baseball tournament held in June in Omaha, Nebraska. The MCWS is the culmination of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Divisi ...

on the back of a 0.65 post season

earned run average In baseball statistics, earned run average (ERA) is the average of earned runs allowed by a pitcher per nine innings pitched (i.e. the traditional length of a game). It is determined by dividing the number of earned runs allowed by the numb ...

produced by assistant coach Ray Hayward's pitching staff. The Red Raiders have since gone on to win Big 12 regular season conference championships in 2016, 2017 and 2019 and again host both Regional and Super Regional rounds of the NCAA Tournament in Lubbock while also making three more appearances in the College World Series (2016, 2018-2019).

Ballpark

Season-by-season results

Source:

Head coaches

Individual accomplishments

Unanimous All-American The College Football All-America Team is an honorific college football all-star team compiled after each NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) season to recognize that season's most outstanding performers at their respective positions. ...

* Jace Jung (2021) * Josh Jung (2019) * Steven Gingery (2017)

National Pitcher of the Year Award The National Pitcher of the Year Award is a college baseball award given to the best pitcher of the college baseball season by the College Baseball Foundation. The current holder of the award is Cooper Hjerpe of the Oregon State Beavers. Winn ...

* Steven Gingery (2017) Big 12 Conference Player of the Year * Jace Jung (2021) * Josh Jung (2019) *Hunter Hargrove (2017) * Eric Gutierrez (2016) *

Joe Dillon Joseph William Dillon (born August 2, 1975) is an American former professional baseball utility player, who played in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Florida Marlins, Milwaukee Brewers, and Tampa Bay Rays, and in Nippon Professional Baseball ...

(1997) Big 12 Conference Pitcher of the Year *Brandon Birdsell (2022) * Steven Gingery (2017) Big 12 Conference Freshman of the Year *Hudson White (2022) *Gabe Holt (2018) * Josh Jung (2017) Big 12 Conference Coach of the Year *

(2016) *

(1997) Big 12 Conference Tournament MVP * Josh Bard (

1998 1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''. Events January * January 6 – The ''Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for frozen water, in soil in permanently s ...

) Southwest Conference Coach of the Year *

(1995) Southwest Conference Tournament MVP *Jason Tolman (

1995 File:1995 Events Collage V2.png, From left, clockwise: O.J. Simpson is acquitted of the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman from the year prior in "The Trial of the Century" in the United States; The Great Hanshin earthquake str ...

) NCAA Division I Regional Tournament MVP *Kurt Wilson (2021, Lubbock) *Cam Warren (2019, Lubbock) *Zach Rheams (2018, Lubbock) *Hayden Howard (2016, Lubbock) *Dylan Dusek (2014, Coral Gables)

Skip Bertman Award The College Baseball Foundation was formed in 2004 in Lubbock, Texas as a non-profit organization, with the dual aims of awarding the Brooks Wallace Award, and creating the National College Baseball Hall of Fame. The organization also annually pres ...

(2014)

Retired jerseys

Red Raiders in the Major Leagues

At least 30 former Texas Tech Red Raiders have gone on to play

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (A ...

.Baseball Almanac: Texas Tech University Baseball Players Who Made it to the Major Leagues
/ref>

Pro Red Raiders in other sports

References

External links

* {{Big12Baseball