http://bleacherreport.com/articles/448705-texas-tech-football-a-call-to-arms-awaken-red-raider-nation
Texas Tech Football: A Call To Arms...Awaken Red Raider Nation!
By Amy Daughters (Texas Tech Featured Columnist) on September 2, 2010 3
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As the first signs of light become recognizable on the horizon, members of a sacred clan watch anxiously for the beginning of another day.
Some wait patiently, looking up into the sky with great anticipation, as others restlessly pace the turf wondering frantically about what lies ahead.
Affiliates of this prestigious band can be found all over the globe; coming together from ordinary and extraordinary places such as Paducah, Conroe, New Waverly, Tokyo, Ballinger, Plano, Burnet, Santa Fe, Blackwell, London, Dayton, Madrid, and Aubrey.
They come from an endless variety of cultures, lifestyles, income levels, and faiths, but are bound together closely by a brand of intense fanaticism intertwined with hope and love.
This is a devotion that can only be drawn from a secret, well-located, deep in the heart of God’s country—entrenched within the hidden recesses of a place known as Lubbock, Texas.
Yes, it is the Red Raider Nation that lies in waiting, with the great anticipation that comes with the dawn of a new football season.
As the summer sun warms to an alarming pitch, this race of football aficionados prepare themselves for yet another campaign upon the gridiron.
Some very logically and realistically analyze the upcoming program of worthy opponents and predict probable victories and defeats, while others fantasize longingly of the glorious triumphs that will surely, finally be theirs at the close of another autumn.
Ronald Martinez/Getty Images Regardless of any preconceived notions or of the individual approach; as the glaring summer sun begins to fade and gives way to the foliage and crisp mornings of fall, all constituents of the Red Raider Nation begin to feel the magic associated with the triumphant return of Texas Tech Red Raider Football.
Drawing on a special, secret part of our hearts, we can feel the brisk Lubbock wind in our faces as we happily traverse across our magnificent campus. Yes, as we trod happily towards our ultimate goal, the sound of the Goin’ Band from Raiderland becomes clearer and louder with each step.
We stride pass the old Tech Bookstore, the 1970’s architecture of the library, the U.C. (now the Student Union), the gracefully towered administration building and Holden Hall. Suddenly names like Horn, Murdough, Sneed, Bledsoe, Chitwood, and Hulen come forth from our hearts and find their way to be sung upon our wind whipped lips.
Wait my friend...Hark! There it is in our sights, our prize awaits us, the backside of the Double T scoreboard. Yes, we have arrived at that sacred site of football glory, that gridiron Mecca that calls us home from around the globe.
Undeniably, even if we can reach this destination only in a mental rather than physical sense, we are at Clifford B. and Audrey Jones Stadium, Jones SBC Stadium, Jones AT&T Stadium—The Jones.
Yes, let them laugh in Austin, in College Station, in Norman and in Stillwater. Let them have a good chuckle as they all anticipate their match up with Texas Tech. Let them prematurely and in preseason count it as a win, and let the flock of national and local sports writers pick us, yet once again, to finish fifth in the Big 12 South.
Ronald Martinez/Getty Images But also, let our rivals secretly lose sleep in the week before their showdown with the Red Raiders in Lubbock, or at any venue for that matter.
Let them subconsciously fret about playing “that little school from Lubbock,” let them hope that for them it is fast and painless, that defeat comes quickly and in the night. Indeed, let them get their excuses ready early this year for why they couldn’t beat a school with less access to state funds, and less support from a faltering press core.
Yes, my dear friends, my Red Raider compatriots, let them laugh nervously when we bring up the game at a cocktail party, baby shower, office coffee room, or casual chat on an airplane, and please prepare them to mention those so called demons in black and white stripes who “gave us the game” once again.
Let us call on one another, in the spirit of our shared passion, oh fellow members of the great Red Raider Nation, to commit this year and in the years ahead of us to expand our dream.
Inflating our fantasy beyond that of a few upsets, a few close games with prestigious football teams, yes, let us take the next progressive step and raise our expectations to a new level.
Let us dream of a glorious Big 12 South title with an opportunity to play for the Conference Championship. And let us build on our postseason successes of the past and dream of bigger and better bowl encounters that will eventually give us the opportunity to compete for a national title.
Jamie Squire/Getty Images Yes, I did say, n-a-t-i-o-n-a-l t-i-t-l-e, and in doing so I am completely prepared to ignore those sports “experts” who deem my unstable mental condition to be caused by visiting the “Fantasyland” section at Disneyland one too many times.
For, I am not a crack smoker, a tainted Kool Aid drinker, or a delusional cerebrally challenged fool; I am a Red Raider football fanatic.
Let this superior vision, these increased expectations, not be limited to only our football team; but let it bleed over to our athletic programs on the whole, and finally to our entire great University.
For it is we, the alumni, the students, the faculty, the fan base, the entire Tech community; hence, the Red Raider Nation who has the responsibility of deciding ultimately just what kind of University we will be.
The time has come, oh great Red Raider Nation, to prepare for the awakening associated with another stoic season of collegiate football.
Let us prepare our scarlet and black war paint, let us fire up the deep fat fryer and defrost the chicken wings, let us fetch our Red Raider gear from the closet.
Indeed, let us arm ourselves with pride, dignity, and spirit, let us gird our loins with fair play, competitiveness, sportsmanship, and, above all. let us raise our expectations as we prepare to bravely approach the season that awaits us with the rising of the magnificent west Texas sun.
Open the trophy case, call forth the Saddle Tramps, and make ready the Victory Bell! This may finally be the season we have waited a lifetime for.
Come hither, let us walk into the daylight together, arm in arm; awaken, awaken oh Red Raider Nation!
“Far better is it to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs even though checkered by failure, than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat.”
-Theodore Roosevelt
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