BYU's Updated Path to the Big 12 Championship Game After Loss to No. 8 Texas Tech

BYU RB LJ Martin runs the football against Texas Tech | BYU Photo

On Saturday, BYU was outclassed in an ugly road loss to no. 8 Texas Tech. While BYU will certainly drop in the College Football Playoff rankings on Tuesday, that doesn't ultimately matter. What BYU lost on Saturday was wiggle room in the Big 12 race. Despite the loss to the Red Raiders, BYU still controls its own destiny to the Big 12 championship game.

In this article, we will breakdown BYU's path to the Big 12 title game after losing to Texas Tech. For BYU to get to the title game, they will need to finish 2-1 at minimum. We will breakdown the scenarios for BYU to get in at 3-0 and 2-1.

1. Win And You're In

There are now three teams in the Big 12 with just one conference loss each: Texas Tech, BYU, and Cincinnati. BYU will travel to play to play at Cincinnati later this month. If BYU wins its last three games, they will play in the Big 12 championship game no matter what happens in the other games.

Now, BYU must do in 2025 what they couldn't do in 2024: finish. The Cougars have three games left:

1. vs TCU
2. at Cincinnati
3. vs UCF

Fortunately for the Cougars, they get to play two of their last three games at home. Unfortunately for BYU, they still have to play two good teams in Cinicinnati and TCU. With the loss to Texas Tech, BYU is now 2-7 in Big 12 games in November. BYU will need to play much better against TCU and Cincinnati than they did against Texas Tech to win both of those games.

2. Help Would Be Required at 2-1

BYU would not be out of the title race if they lose another game, but they would lose control of their own destiny at that point. If BYU loses to TCU but beats Cincinnati, there would still be a chance to BYU to get to the title game if the other two-loss teams are Utah and Cincinnati. BYU would win the tiebreaker in that scenario, assuming TCU and Houston have at least one more loss than they had going into Saturday.

If BYU loses to Cincinnati, the Cougars would have an uphill battle to the title game. BYU would need Cincinnati to lose at least one more game and then hope the tiebreaker dominoes fall in their favor.

Either way, it would be an uphill battle for BYU to go 10-2 and make the Big 12 championship game.

It's paramount that BYU doesn't let the loss to Texas Tech turn into two losses. BYU still has everything to play for.