DTN Daily Diatribe | Texas Tech News, Notes and Links | 2012-02-20

RED RAIDER SOFTBALL | The softball team continued their winning ways and on Sunday, they won their third straight double-header (won a double-header on Friday and then on Saturday) and ran their record for the year to 7-4. In the first game, the Red Raiders beat DePaul 2-1 (official site) and then blew out Utah St. 11-2 in the second game (official site). The softball plays next weekend in a tournament in Waco.

TEXAS TECH BASEBALL | The baseball team went 1-1 yesterday, winning the first game of the double-header against Tennessee Tech 8-0 (official site) losing their first game of the year to Missouri St., 2-4 (official site) and are 3-1 for the year. Starter Rusty Shellhorn was fantastic (7.0 IP | 4 H | 0 ER | 1 BB | 6 SO) while the offense belted out 12 hits and 3B Reid Redman, 1B Scott LeJeune, DH Bo Altobellli and SS Tim Proudfoot all had a multi-hit game.

In the second game, starter Daniel Coulombe went 5.1 innings with 1 earned run, 5 strikeouts, 1 walk and 43 of 67 pitches went for strikes. The bad part of the weekend is that closer John Neely faltered in his lone action of the weekend, giving up a 2-1 lead. Still, that's a small worry. CF Barrett Barnes continues to rake and went 3-3 yesterday with an RBI. A handful of Red Raiders made the Red Raider Classic all-tournament team (PDF) and the baseball team is back in action next weekend in Lubbock with the Brooks Wallace Memorial Classic.

LAJ's George Watson and DT's Brett Winegarner both have recaps from yesterday, and head coach Dan Spencer from Watson's article:

"I thought it was a good weekend," Tech coach Dan Spencer said. "Like I told our guys just now: It was a good weekend, not a great weekend, just from the standpoint of going 3-1 and we’ll take that as good.

"We took too long to make an adjustment to (Missouri State starter Clay Murphy) today offensively and hit into a bunch of double plays. But our focus was good, and the effort and will to do it was there. Overall I thought we did a nice job, but obviously there’s room to get better."

LAJ's Watson also has a weekend notebook.

LADY RAIDER BASKETBALL | LAJ's David Just writes about the tournament chances for the Lady Raiders and that they still have time to reach the NCAA Tournament, and this sounds about right:

"Hopefully, we’re going to be able to finish this thing strong," Tech coach Kristy Curry said. "You get in the eyes of the (NCAA selection) committee, they have to take a look at your scores every once in awhile."

Despite losing four of six games in February and each of its last six road games, Tech controls its own destiny and, with four games remaining, has enough time left to salvage the season.

To do so, though, Texas Tech will likely have to win at least three of its remaining games and possibly one or two more at next month’s Big 12 tournament.

TEXAS TECH FOOTBALL | LAJ's Don Williams profiles DT Delvon Simmons and he talks a bit about playing as a freshman and lacking the confidence:

"I was pretty happy I got to play as a freshman," he said, "but at times ... I thought I was ready, but I didn’t have the confidence to go in there and play. I guess if I would have had more confidence, then I would have played a little bit better. I don’t think I played as good as I could have."

Simmons also talks a bit about how his biggest adjustment was rushing the passer as he was apparently not accustomed to offensive linemen playing off the line of scrimmage:

"I never really had any (pass blocker) set back so far on me on pass rush," he said, "because I came from a running-style conference. They mainly ran the ball. I think that was the biggest adjustment, trying to pass rush. Obviously, we didn’t do too good, but we’re working on it."

Simmons also credits SACC Joe Walker with getting stronger.