Texas Tech Monday Morning Notes - Becoming A Player Edition

More Recruiting Info From Blog Brothers

Our Texas Tech bretheren bloggers have been busy and if you're interested in reading about anything other than a certain coach and a certain administration, then feel free to visit Tortilla Retort, RaiderAde or Flags Over Raiderland.

Also, ESPN Big 12 blogger Tim Griffin has a Texas Tech recruiting capsule.

Leach Stuff

I'll keep this short and sweet. If you want to read my thoughts on the saga of Mike Leach and Texas Tech then feel free to read Saturday and Sunday posts about the whole mess.

I'll repeat what I said in comments in an earlier post, which is that it's strange how this issue is dividing a fan base and people are so passionate about it. Much like Seinfeld, I typically cheer for laundry and the name on the back of the jersey or the head coach doesn't matter  --  I'll generally cheer for whoever is wearing the scarlet and black. I think you guys have known me long enough to figure out that I'm pretty laid back when it comes to criticism, as an example, I'm hopeful that Pat Knight turns it around when I think most were ready to give up on him after this season.

On one side, you have a coach, who has won at Texas Tech and he's a known commodity, but he has flirted with other head coaching vacancies and he wants to continue his current relationship with Texas Tech, which is to coach and if something better comes along, then he can take a look at it. But as stated above, Leach is a known commodity and no matter who you bring in to coach at Texas Tech, unless it's someone with a proven track record, then there's going to be a question as to whether or not he can coach this football team and win with the same success as Leach has.

On the other side, you have an administration that dug in it's heels very early about money, refused to negotiate over a year ago, and with the latest contract proposal has changed the terms of the deal to be more restrictive for Leach so that it's more difficult for him to look elsewhere. It's almost as if the administration is pushing their chips all in and now it's time for Mike to call or fold.

In any event, keep in mind that I want people to be entitled to an opinion here at Double-T Nation and I'm not going to censor anyone for having a strong opinion about either side and I hope no one else does either. That's not what a forum is about, it's about letting people speak/write their mind about this current situation.

I'd hate for people to think that because a person has an opinion about the situation that he or she is trying to divide the fan base even further, simply because we wouldn't be choosing sides if we had two parties that wanted to work together in the administration and Texas Tech.

If anything, these two parties (Myers/Hance and Leach/agents) get my collective blame for causing this rift in the fanbase, not anyone here.

Lewandowski Improving

LAJ's Don Williams writes about feshman center Robert Lewandowski's considerable improvement over the course of the year. What I love about Lew's game is that it's incredible old school, which is still effective and now it makes sense as Lew has been working with senior athletic director Steve Downing, a former player for Bob Knight at Indiana:

Knight said the last part is almost taken for granted. He’s found the big freshman to be a self-starter and dedicated when it comes to working on his game. The 6-foot-10 Lewandowski discovered a resource in 6-foot-8 Steve Downing, Tech’s senior associate athletic director who starred for Bob Knight at Indiana before being a Boston Celtics first-round pick in 1973.

Pat Knight said Downing has been a mentor and sounding board for Lewandowski and helps him with the finer points of post play.

And Junior Knight had some nice things to say about his freshman center:

"Unbelievable,’’ Knight said. "I didn’t think he was going to be this good this fast. I really thought he was going be a really good role player. I was just going to throw him into the fire this year and let him learn. He is becoming a player, and he’s only a freshman.’’

Following Up the Baylor Win

DT's Alex Ybarra recaps Saturday night's win against Baylor and thought this exchange was pretty interesting:

Tech trailed by 12 points midway through the second half before using a 19-8 run to wrestle the Bears' lead to 63-62 with eight minutes remaining.

Tech called a timeout when it trailed by 12 points, and coach Pat Knight said he wanted to run a zone to stop the bleeding on defense, but his players respectfully disagreed and welcomed the challenge of guarding some of the quickest guards in the Big 12 in Curtis Jerrells, LaceDarius Dunn, Tweety Carter and Henry Dugat.

"The guys didn't wanna go to a zone," Knight said. "They said, 'we'll take our man, let's switch it up a little bit,' and they wanted to stay in man. They thought they could defend them, and they proved to me that they could."

I've hated seeing the zone and now that I know this bit of information, I think it's clear that Texas Tech is a much better man-to-man team as it always seems the Red Raiders are scrambling on the zone.