SAN ANTONIO - - Texas Tech head coach Joey McGuire shakes his head and laughs when he reads the anonymous coaching surveys and the stories demonizing his Red Raiders for spending big bucks on transfers, recruits, and facility upgrades. 

McGuire sent 98 players to Division I as a high school football coach for 23 years. On Monday in San Antonio, he was at his 31st Texas High School Coaching Association Convention. He’s not naïve to how recruiting has worked for decades. And like the saying goes, it ain’t as fun when the rabbit’s got the gun.

“It is kind of comical because it’s suddenly wrong now that Texas Tech is doing it?” McGuire asked rhetorical during his press conference. “I don’t know any coach that wouldn’t want the support at that we have at Texas Tech University. I think some of it is kind of hypocritical.”

He won’t apologize for good planning and foresight. McGuire said athletic director Kirby Hocutt and mega donor Cody Campbell began planning the best strategy of how to use NIL and revenue sharing two years prior. The Red Raiders frontloaded contracts for returning players, portal additions, and high school signees with NIL ahead of the July 1 start of revenue sharing, where a clearing house is now in charge of reviewing those NIL agreements moving forward. 

That’s allowed Texas Tech to assemble one of the most expensive rosters in America and should also allow the program to spend more money in revenue sharing to keep the squad together for 2026. Money has always dictated a program’s standing in college football’s hierarchy. The resources were spent differently – bigger stadiums, nicer locker rooms, water falls in the weight room, better coaching staffs – but like anything, it cost big to play big. 

Understandably, the old money doesn’t approve of the new money; programs like Texas Tech and SMU emerging are threats to the system, one that benefits the blue bloods that could always hoard the best players. The number of national championship level prospects is finite. The more who sign with the Texas Techs of the world, the fewer there are for Alabama. 

“I don’t know what Texas’ payroll was last year, or what Ohio State’s payroll was last year. But nobody was surprised that they were (spending) at that level,” McGuire explained. “And then all of a sudden, Texas Tech decides that we’re going to be extremely aggressive in that world and do it the right way and it shouldn’t be done at Texas Tech?” 

McGuire knows there is an oversized target on their back this season. He’s raised the floor at Texas Tech and became the first coach since the 1950s to post a winning record in conference play in each of his first three seasons. The next step is to raise the ceiling. The Red Raiders haven’t won a conference championship since they were members of the Border Conference and have only won 10 games once since 1976. 

“I understand that there will be a lot of people who want to play us, to prove us wrong,” McGuire said. “To say, ‘you spent all this money and this is what your team looks like?’”

The Big 12 eliminated the media poll this season but it is fair to say that Texas Tech would’ve been in the top tier alongside Arizona State, Kansas State, and maybe Utah. The 8.5-win total in Las Vegas is amongst the highest in the conference. But doubters exist. As do the haters. McGuire is known to talk a big game. As a high school coach at Cedar Hill, he backed it up with championships. If he can do the same in West Texas is up for debate. 

“I think expectations are great,” McGuire said. “I would rather be in this position than in a position where you’re like, man, if everything goes right and the ball bounces our way, maybe we can become bowl eligible. I’d rather be on this side of it where people expect us to be in the Big 12 championship. I know that’s what our fans expect. I know that’s what our administration expects. I know everybody in our building expects that. We’ve got to go out and really just focus on us.”