{"id":72221,"date":"2025-12-02T00:44:17","date_gmt":"2025-12-02T00:44:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/72221\/"},"modified":"2025-12-02T00:44:17","modified_gmt":"2025-12-02T00:44:17","slug":"no-5-texas-tech-is-on-the-rise-and-looking-to-lock-up-a-top-four-cfp-seed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/72221\/","title":{"rendered":"No. 5 Texas Tech is on the rise and looking to lock up a top-four CFP seed"},"content":{"rendered":"

Texas Tech was No. 5 in last week\u2019s College Football Playoff rankings and on Sunday jumped two spots to No. 5 in The Associated Press Top 25 poll<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Red Raiders likely will be No. 4 when the new CFP rankings<\/a> come out Tuesday night. That would position them to receive a bye for the first round if they beat BYU for the second time this season in the Big 12 championship game Saturday. <\/p>\n

Depending on the outcomes of the SEC and Big Ten title games, they could be as high as No. 2 when the final CFP rankings are released next Sunday.<\/p>\n

The opportunity to enhance its seeding was not lost on Texas Tech in its final regular-season game at West Virginia. The Red Raiders won 49-0<\/a>, scoring on their opening three possessions and four of their first five.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know we\u2019ve got to go win the Big 12, and that will help us, but we want to move up,\u201d coach Joey McGuire said. \u201cWe\u2019re at 5 right now and we want to get as high as we can get in those rankings. I think it\u2019ll make a huge difference for us.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Red Raiders have won five straight since their only loss, 26-22 at Arizona State<\/a> on Oct. 18. Granted, four of the opponents finished 10th or lower in the Big 12 but their 211-36 scoring advantage over the last five games is impressive. They\u2019re tied with No. 2 Indiana for widest margin of victory over that span, at 175 points, and the 36 points they\u2019ve allowed are fewest by an FBS team.<\/p>\n

Their toughest game in the closing stretch was against then-No. 8 BYU, and they were in control the whole way while holding the Cougars to 255 yards and winning 29-7.<\/a><\/p>\n

At 11-1, the Red Raiders have matched their program record for wins in a season, and their eight Big 12 wins are their most. They\u2019re only the sixth team in 100 years to win at least 11 regular-season games by 20-plus points.<\/p>\n

Now it\u2019s on to the Big 12 title game for the first time.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s really, really cool,\u201d quarterback Behren Morton said. \u201cKind of emotional, being a Lubbock kid. You\u2019ve worked so hard to be in the position you\u2019re in now. It\u2019s just really cool to look up and see what we\u2019ve done this year. But we\u2019re not done yet.\u201d<\/p>\n

Navy makes season debut<\/p>\n

It seemed like a long time coming, but Navy finally made the Top 25, checking in at No. 23 on Sunday. The Midshipmen were knocking on the door after a 7-0 start, then lost two straight. They\u2019ve beaten a then-No. 25 South Florida<\/a> at home and Memphis on the road in their last two games.<\/p>\n

Navy, which has the Army game Dec. 13 before going to a bowl, finished in a three-way tie for first in the American Conference. A 31-17 loss at North Texas<\/a> on Nov. 1 kept the Midshipmen out of the conference championship game.<\/p>\n

Navy, the No. 1 rushing team in the nation, was held to 200 yards on the ground in its 28-17 win over Memphis.<\/a> It was the Midshipmen\u2019s second-lowest output of the season. The defense rose up to end the Tigers\u2019 streak of scoring 20 points at 51 games.<\/p>\n

Bison get some love<\/p>\n

North Dakota State was acknowledged for its dominance in the Football Championship Subdivision, ranked No. 23 on the ballot of Cedar Rapids (Iowa) Gazette sports columnist Mike Hlas. That was good for three poll points, more than four FBS teams that also received votes.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s had a season similar to Indiana\u2019s, and it\u2019s been as steady a winner over the last 10 years as Alabama,\u201d Hlas said in a text.<\/p>\n

NDSU, which has won 10 of the last 14 FCS championships, is the top seed in the playoffs<\/a> and will host Illinois State on Saturday.<\/p>\n

The Bison previously received votes in 28 polls over six seasons between 2011-19. The closest they\u2019ve come to cracking the Top 25 was in 2016, when they were two spots out following a 23-21 upset of an 11th-ranked Iowa. <\/p>\n

Nine other FCS teams have received votes since 2007.<\/p>\n

Extra points<\/p>\n

Indiana coach Curt Cignetti\u2019s 23 victories so far are second most in Big Ten history in the first two seasons at a school. The second-ranked Hoosiers\u2019 56-3 victory over Purdue<\/a> broke a tie with Fielding Yost, who had 22 wins in 1901-02 at Michigan. Urban Meyer won 24 games in 2012-13 at Ohio State. … No. 3 Georgia joined Florida (1992-96) as the only programs to make five consecutive Southeastern Conference championship game appearances. The Bulldogs will be playing in the game for a 13th time when they square off against No. 10 Alabama<\/a> on Saturday. … No. 14 Texas\u2019 27-17 win over then-No. 3 Texas A&M<\/a> made the Longhorns the first team since LSU in 2019 to beat three AP top-10 teams in a season.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

Get poll alerts and updates on the AP Top 25 throughout the season. Sign up here<\/a> and here<\/a> (AP News mobile app). AP college football: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/ap-top-25-college-football-poll<\/a> and https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/college-football<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Texas Tech was No. 5 in last week\u2019s College Football Playoff rankings and on Sunday jumped two spots…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":72222,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[557,1890,23047,23042,23045,261,416,36130,1888,28061,168,170,169,36129,9969,154,27,415,1891,1760,9814],"class_list":["post-72221","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-lubbock","tag-associated-press","tag-big-12-conference","tag-big-ten-conference","tag-brigham-young-cougars","tag-brigham-young-cougars-football","tag-college-football","tag-college-sports","tag-curt-cignetti","tag-joey-mcguire","tag-local-news-for-apple","tag-lubbock","tag-lubbock-headlines","tag-lubbock-news","tag-mike-hlas","tag-southeastern-conference","tag-sports","tag-texas","tag-texas-tech-red-raiders","tag-texas-tech-red-raiders-football","tag-tx-state-wire","tag-west-virginia-mountaineers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72221","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72221"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72221\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/72222"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72221"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72221"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72221"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}