The Big 12 Champion Texas Tech Red Raiders returned to Lubbock tonight and were welcome with a large number of fans as members of the basketball program cut down the net from the rim one by one. Head coach Chris Beard briefly spoke with the media following the net cutting.

Chris Beard

- Beard started off describing the moment the Red Raiders defeated Iowa State and clinched a share of the Big 12 title. “We told the guys the first of the year, ‘you get a chance at four championships in a season here.’ MTE tournament, we got that done, regular season championship, which is special for us because it’s an 18-round fight and now we’ll go to Kansas City and try to number three and ultimately we’d like to the national championship, that’ll end on a Monday night. So far two for two, we look forward to being a part of the next two as well.”

- When asked what about his team has surprised him, Beard had this to say, “Nothing really surprises – we’ve got character and led by those four seniors. We had a real expectation and belief in our locker room, a lot of people outside of our locker room, whether they picked us last in the league or ‘you’re not going to be back because you lost so much from last year’s team,’ we just had an inner confidence based on those four seniors that we could do some great things.”

- Beard said he is going to go to Whataburger and possibly get a Gatorade to celebrate tonight. “Maybe something different than a Gatorade.”

- On his team’s performance against Iowa State, “The big thing this week in preparation was have an answer. Because you know in these championship games, the other team is going to play great. Iowa State did. I thought every time Iowa State did something we had an answer. We overcame some tough calls today, we overcame some hot shooting, we overcame some mistakes, but we always had an answer.”

- With everyone in the program getting a chance to celebrate, Beard said the student manager is just as important as Jarrett Culver.

- Before the game against Iowa State, Beard told Culver he did not need to score 30 but Culver ended up scoring 31 against the Cyclones. “As long as we can keep getting 31, I think we’ll be fine.”

- When told he was like Nostradamus, after saying a year ago that Tech will win the Big 12 title one day, Beard said, “Who’s Nostradamus? I’m a P.E. major.”