SerpApi.Org
FRISCO, Texas — It wasn’t a typical Big 12 football media days appearance for Texas Tech coach Joey McGuire two weeks ago.
To begin with, McGuire was headed to the annual event as the head coach of the defending league champions for the first time. And with a roster that’s been retooled with high-end talent, the expectation is that the Red Raiders will contend not just for the conference championship but for a second-straight College Football Playoff appearance.
Additionally, though, McGuire entered an arena where talk about Texas Tech would inevitably center around the Brendan Sorsby saga and the drama it’s caused in the sports community.
The 56-year-old who is headed into his fifth season as Red Raiders head coach handled the heightened expectations and scrutiny with aplomb.
“One thing that I truly believe in is to bring a team together, shared success is part of it, but shared adversity brings you even closer,” McGuire said from the podium at Big 12 media days.
That adversity has revolved around Sorsby, the former Cincinnati quarterback who transferred to Texas Tech this offseason, and his battle to regain his eligibility after admitting to having a gambling addiction. Per reports, Sorsby placed thousands of sports bets over the past few years, including on his own team.
Sorsby ultimately won’t play this season, which means he’ll never actually play a down for Texas Tech, and will instead begin preparations for the 2027 NFL draft.
That comes after several controversial back-and-forth moves as Sorsby and his legal team fought to overturn the NCAA’s initial ruling that deemed him ineligible to play after his actions broke the administration’s bylaws on gambling.
Texas Tech, amidst this, supported Sorsby as he went through rehab and the school’s administration worked through the NCAA processes seeking reinstatement from permanent eligibility.
That support drew plenty of scrutiny from the sports community in general, with the integrity of sports brought into question.
Multiple institutions, including the Big Ten’s Nebraska and the SEC’s Georgia, considered not scheduling Texas Tech, not just in football but all sports, if it continued down a path that would lead to Sorsby lining up under center.
At one point, the Big 12 filed a federal lawsuit against Texas Tech and the Texas Attorney General’s office, seeking to legally enforce the conference’s right to sanction the school under its bylaws. That came after a Texas judge granted Sorsby a temporary injunction against the NCAA that would have permitted him to play in the 2026 season.
Ultimately, though, Sorsby withdrew his lawsuit against the NCAA and after his request to enter the NFL supplemental draft was denied, he began preparations for the 2027 draft.
Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark did not comment on the Sorsby situation during Big 12 media days, instead choosing to focus on the future.
“Today is not the time to address that issue,” he said.
Did the support of Brendan Sorsby come at a cost?
When asked if supporting Sorsby had come with a personal cost, McGuire expressed appreciation for the response he received from the coaching community.
“It’s tough. You know, the thing for me that through all of this, my president and my AD, who are good friends of mine, who believed in me, who hired me, they went through a lot. If you look as a whole, there were not a lot of coaches that said really a whole lot,” McGuire said. “There were some funny jabs taken by some coaches, but there wasn’t a lot of coaches that just really came out and said a lot of different things.
“For my peers, I got a lot of support. (Oklahoma State coach) Eric Morris, the first day any news broke, called me and said, ‘Hey, man, I’m just doing a wellness check.’ He’s a good friend of mine. (BYU coach) Kalani (Sitake), a great friend of mine, said the same thing. (Arizona State coach) Kenny Dillingham made a joke in a group text and called me and said, ‘You know, I was kidding.’ I said, ‘Kenny, dude, I get it, man.’”
One sign of support that came under particular scrutiny occurred on June 11, when the school released a letter from Texas Tech president Lawrence Schovanec and a 20-minute video from school leadership — it included Schovanec, athletic director Kirby Hocutt and McGuire — that attempted to explain why the school stood behind Sorsby.
McGuire shared his concern that people, particularly in the Texas Tech community, understood why that decision was made.
“For me, my peers, I had so much support from my peers. And it was tough to see Kirby and President Schovanec have to go through that. I hate that for them,” McGuire said.
“The thing that we really try to focus on is the Red Raiders and our alumni base and our boosters. That’s who — whenever I’ve talked to, answered any emails, texts, or anything like that, those are the ones that I concerned to make sure they understand where we were coming from."
How the team has responded to the situation
While news surrounding the Sorsby saga has begun to fade as the calendar dips into late July, it’s been a situation that members of the team have dealt with in recent months as the Red Raiders prepare for the 2026 season and the defense of their conference title.
McGuire said the Red Raiders leaned on their leadership council — captained by linebacker Ben Roberts and center Sheridan Wilson — to help the program navigate the negative commotion emanating from the outside world.
“The last couple of months we had gone through some adversity. I do believe if you walked into our building every single day and you walked into the weight room and the workouts or football school, you wouldn’t know that anything was going on. A big part of that has been Ben and Sheridan,” McGuire said.
“We met multiple times, you know, with them being our two captains, and really I’ve talked through this with those guys and how they felt and what we wanted to do. They’ve been incredible.”
Senior tight end Terrance Carter Jr. said he’s kept in contact with Sorsby as the process has played out.
“I was definitely heartbroken once we heard about it, because that was my guy,” Carter told reporters at media days. “We built a pretty strong relationship for the time that he’s been there. ... You gotta just be there for them and that’s just all I’m doing right now.”
How Sorsby handled things throughout the process also made an impression on Carter.
“You wouldn’t even have known just by the way he came in every day, he always had a smile on his face, uplifting people. It sucked, but we gotta get to what’s next,” Carter said.
The Red Raiders return 13 starters, again had a top-10 transfer portal class, and should also benefit from a favorable schedule that sees them avoid other Big 12 contenders like BYU and Utah during the regular season.
While the league didn’t release a preseason poll for the second straight year, Texas Tech leads all Big 12 schools with seven players on the preseason all-conference team. Defensive lineman AJ Holmes Jr. also earned Preseason Big 12 Defensive Player of the Year honors.
That strong veteran presence, McGuire said, has helped keep his team honed in on the season ahead.
“I’m really fortunate. We’ve got a strong, really strong, leadership group: Cam Dickey, J’Koby Williams, Howard Sampson, guys like that. Just really strong people, and they kept us focused on football,” McGuire said. “At no point did I feel, you know, over the last few months that anything is taken away from the football as far as in the building.”
Will there be lingering effects from the Sorsby saga?
The next big landmark ahead of the 2026 season will come when the Red Raiders return for camp in the next couple weeks, as they prepare for their season opener Sept. 5 against Abilene Christian.
There’s still a question of who will start at quarterback for Texas Tech in that game — sophomore Will Hammond, who backed up Behren Morton last year, is coming off an ACL tear, though last week, McGuire expressed optimism that Hammond could be ready to play Week 1.
How much scrutiny the Red Raiders over the Sorsby ordeal between now and the regular season is yet to be determined, even if the noise has begun to die down.
The goal for Texas Tech remains the same.
“Win the Big 12 Conference. There’s only been two teams in the history of this conference no matter who has been in the conference — there’s only been two teams that have won back-to-back Big 12 Championships. That’s OU (Oklahoma) and Baylor shared, I believe, their conference titles," McGuire said.
“We want to do something that very few teams have been able to do, and that’s to win the Big 12 championship again. You know, I think it’s really important. I think it’s really important that this conference gets multiple teams in the playoffs.”
McGuire also wants to see not just his Texas Tech team but other league programs representing the Big 12 well. In the two years of a 12-team playoff, the conference is 0-2 in College Football Playoff games, including the Red Raiders’ 23-0 loss to Oregon in the CFP quarterfinals.
Others, like BYU and Utah, are among the conference teams who are expected to challenge for a CFP berth in 2026.
“I think there’s an obligation as programs in this conference that we play at a high level, and then I think it’s really important that we win in the playoffs,” McGuire said. “Until we do that as a conference, then we’re going to continue to have the same narrative that we have right now.”
