Even if you phrase it as carefully as a major leaguer testifying before Congress, ask Kansas coach Bill Self who he thinks should be the national coach of the year and you're likely to get about the same answer as if you'd just asked him to explain the economic stimulus plan. 
Anton Chigurh didn't toy with his victims as much as Mike Leach toyed with Mack Brown tonight. After letting Texas take its first lead of the game with less than one and a half minutes left, the Red Raiders put together a ruthlessly efficient up-tempo drive capped by a Graham Harrell to Michael Crabtree touchdown pass with only one second left, putting Tech up 38-33.
Adam James, son of ABC analyst Craig James, is currently a 6-3, 220-pound freshman at Texas Tech. While college football fans remember his dad as - one-half of the "Pony Express" backfield, turned CFB talking head - Adam takes his father's fame in stride:I don't even think about it," James said. "I mean, when you get to know him, he's really a normal guy. So to me, it doesn't even feel like he is."Adam James was a greyshirt in the fall, meaning the spring practices have given Texas Tech coaches the first glimpse of what he is capable of.
"We don't entirely know what we have with him," [Texas Tech coach Mike] Leach said after Monday's practice. "We're looking forward to seeing. I think he's got real soft natural hands and catches the ball real well."Those receiving skills might mean that Adam winds up as a tight end in the Red Raiders pass-happy offense. Lining up at TE could be just what Adam needs to help escape the shadow of his father's three-time all-SWC career as a running back at SMU. However, if Craig James is anything like I imagine, "Old Pony" will gleefully remind Adam of his 96-yard TD reception against North Texas in 1982 that set a new record as the longest scoring play in Southwest Conference history.
Darryl Dora scored 19 points as Texas Tech upset Kansas 69-64, but if you think that's the kind of thing that would put Tech coach Bob Knight in a good mood, well, you don't know Bob Knight. He called it a private conversation -- if it even happened -- with Wildcats' athletic director Tim Weiser."Who I talk to and who I don't talk to privately is just what it is," he said. "I don't talk about phone conversations."
I think every teenager with inquisitive parents should adopt that policy: "I don't talk about phone conversations." Take that down, kids. If your parents overhear something you tell a friend on the phone and start sticking their nose where it doesn't belong, just follow Bob Knight's lead.
The name should sound vaguely familiar. Bicknell was the head coach at Louisiana Tech from 1999 until his termination at the end of last year when the team lost a school record 10 games and was outscored by 300 points.[Texas Tech coach Mike] Leach needed an offensive line coach when Bill Bedenbaugh decided go with Sonny Dykes to join the staff at Arizona. Bicknell needed a job when Louisiana Tech fired him at the end of a 3-10 season.Notably, Bicknell is a rare hire from outside Leach's immediate coaching tree.
Conveniently, Bicknell's background is on the offensive line: In the early 1980s, he played center for his father's team at Boston College. He's spent portions of his coaching career working with offensive linemen at New Hampshire and, before he was promoted to head coach, at Louisiana Tech.
When Texas Tech football coach Mike Leach added Jack Bicknell Jr. to his staff last week, the move seemed to break with one of Leach's hiring patterns. Nearly everyone else who has worked on Leach's offensive staff during the previous seven years had either played for him or coached alongside him before.Sometimes it's good to shake things up.
In other words, all of Leach's lieutenants had established a prior relationship.
Here's some notable news from the Red Raiders' media release in anticipation of their game against Southern Methodist on Saturday (7 p.m. Eastern)."For whatever reason, they claim is that whoever is making the decision is backlogged," Leach told the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal.Until that is resolved, all the Red Raiders coach can do is wait in frustration while preparing for Saturday's game.
"They have the luxury of putting off the decision, whereas I don't have the luxury of rescheduling games when I'm backlogged."
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