Dear Texas Tech, 

We’ve been together for a long time. 

In 1928, the year penicillin was discovered and Herbert Hoover was elected president, we played our first game against each other. We won 12-0 and continued our win streak across six more games, which ended when you won in 1955. 

Since 1958, we’ve been in the same conference. You joined us in the Southwestern Conference, where we were a tight-knit Texas crew — and Arkansas was there too. We were on the same level as the Southeastern Conference back then in prestige and success. 

However, after recruiting scandals and NCAA probations, our conference was broken down and tattered. Arkansas made the jump to the SEC, which at that point had a larger television audience and was making more money because of it. The SWC was forced to disassemble. 

But we stayed together. 

We moved to the Big 12 Conference in the fall of 1996, joining Oklahoma and Oklahoma State in the South Division. 

In the Big 12 Conference, you won 13 out of 52 games. You have primarily won in Lubbock, where over the years you have won about half of your games, giving you an 11–21 record. 

However, the energy at Darrell K Royal Stadium seems to throw you off. Out of the 37 times you have traveled to Austin, you have only won six games.  

Last year, in the first game of the conference season, an overtime 20-yard field goal led all your fans to rush onto the sold-out Jones AT&T Stadium field to celebrate a 37-34 win. However, you had to make up for the year before, when we beat you 70-35. 

We’ve come together 69 times and played the same game. You’ve traveled to Austin and we’ve gone to Lubbock. Last year, we played you in the first conference game of the season. This year, we play you in the last. 

This final game between us is important. It’s the last time we play against each other in the same conference. It’s an opportunity to earn our first 11-win regular season since 2009. 

It’s the last conference game that we play in the Big 12. 

Unfortunately, this long-distance relationship just isn’t working for us anymore. We have loved our time together, but it is time for us to move on, just like Arkansas did before. 

It’s not you, it’s us. 

We wish you the best of luck in whatever comes next, with the exception of this next game and any other non-conference game we may play against each other in. 

And as always, hook ’em!

Love,

Texas