Monday Morning Matador: championships, sweet sixteens and more

Monday, May 14 is just about as bland a Monday as you can get - luckily there’s some good stuff for Red Raider fans to get excited about.

Texas Tech men’s track and field team takes Big 12 championship, men and women athletes take individual titles

Sweeping both the indoor and outdoor track and field championships, the men’s team dominated this year’s conference. Finishing at 165 points, most since the conference realignment, head coach Wes Kittley simply said “this was so incredible.” The team garnered nods for gold in the 100m, 200m, 4x100m, 800m, and discus events. Women’s track and field team finished at 6th place with 92 points, but weren’t without their incredible performances in high jump, triple jump, 100m, 400m, 400m hurdles, 4x100m, and 4x400m. Many Red Raiders created new personal bests and even moved up some national rankings. Several of the men and women athletes will now enter the West Regionals as national contenders. Regionals will take place in Sacramento, California from May 24-26.

No. 11 women’s tennis take down Army, Illinois to advance to Sweet 16

The Lady Raiders are headed to the NCAA Sweet Sixteen after defeating Army 4-0 and Illinois 4-2 this past weekend. No. 28 Senior, Sarah Dvorak and Sabrina Federici fell, 6-4, to No. 80 Daniela Novak and Sasha Belaya followed by Alex Valenstein and Lana Rush dropping a 6-3 decision on court three. These would be the only victories for Illinois. Dvorak then would go on to put the Lady Raiders on the board with her 6-1, 6-0 singles victory. She extended her win streak to five matches and is now 9-3 when playing at the No. 5 position. Gabriela Talaba had the most exciting match up against Illinois’ no. 1 player, Jaclyn Switkes, whom she handled in two straight sets. That win moves Talaba to 13-6 at the no. 1 position. More match information at the title-link above. Up next for the Lady Raiders is an old fashioned rivalry against No. 6 Texas on May 17th in Winston-Salem, N.C.

Texas Tech softball gets bids to National Invitational Softball Championship

Earning wins in eight of its last ten games, Texas Tech softball proved its fortitude and reputability to garner an invitation to the NISC. Head coach Adrian Gregory said that “obviously, we are disappointed that we did not make it into the NCAA Tournament, but we are very grateful for the opportunity to keep playing and extending our season. “The NISC allows our young team to gain postseason experience, to know what it feels like to play stress-free without school and to give all of their energy to the game. This will be a great building block as we strive for the NCAA Tournament next year. We are excited and welcome the challenge.” This marks the sixth postseason appearance for the softball program and the first invite to the NISC.

Assistant coach Al Pinkins lands position with the University of Florida

Red Raider basketball said goodbye to another quality member of its coaching staff last week. Al Pinkins decided to field and accept an offer from the University of Flordia to fill in as their assistant head coach (with a pay raise). Pinkins joined the Red Raiders in 2016 after spending the previous five seasons on a SEC coaching carousel between LSU, Tennessee and Ole Miss. If you’ll recall, this is Texas Tech’s second departure in the offseason after Chris Ogden took the head coaching position at UT-Arlington. However, some believe that this is not a sign of a faltering program; quite the opposite. Read here for more about that.

Is it time to panic over Texas Tech Baseball?! Who knows, they have a big series against Oklahoma State to wrap up conference play before the Big 12 tournament. Catch that May 17-19 on Fox Sports Southwest. Now finish that coffee and get back to work!