Texas Tech Coach Begs Fans To Stop Throwing Tortillas On The Field

Texas Tech football coach Joey McGuire has flat-out had enough.

After Saturday’s 42-17 victory over the University of Kansas, McGuire used his postgame press conference to beg Texas Tech fans to refrain from what’s become a beloved tradition: hurling tortillas onto the field.

“Is that a Red Raider?” McGuire, steamed, asked reporters after the game. “You came to the game and you love this team and you’re passionate about this team, but yet you’re going to throw another tortilla and you know it’s against the rules?”

The Red Raiders ultimately came out on top despite impassioned hucksters twice drawing penalties on their own team. For McGuire, it seems there’s no such thing as a casual (flatbread) fling.

The two calls of unsportsmanlike conduct ― which came after two warnings ― combined for 30 yards in penalties. The first interrupted a 17-point run by Kansas, and the second came after a definitive 55-yard Raiders rushing touchdown.

Athletics directors in the Big 12 conference voted 15-1 in August in favor of disciplinary measures for fans throwing things on the field. The lone holdout? Texas Tech Athletics Director Kirby Hocutt.

“I’m frustrated,” McGuire lamented Saturday. “We’ve got a new rule in this league. We know the rule and we didn’t follow it and we got penalized tonight.”

“You made it about you,” he continued, addressing the tortilla renegades. “If you’re throwing tortillas more than once, it becomes all about you.”

Texas Tech doesn’t allow fans to open carry the food item, forcing would-be tortilla wielders to take matters into their own hands.

The pro-tortilla-tossing blog TechTortillas.com advises fans “to slide a 10 or 20 pack of tortillas” in their cowboy boots to get past security. Alternate strategies include taping them to your chest or folding them inside a cowboy hat.