FRISCO, Texas — Texas Tech officials fired back at Texas coach Steve Sarkisian on Thursday, a week after Sarkisian implied that the Longhorns’ backups could go undefeated against Texas Tech’s upcoming football schedule.

The Red Raiders’ response: Let’s play each other in Week 1 this fall, and we’ll even pay to make it happen.

Sarkisian did not mention Texas Tech specifically when speaking at a fan event in Houston last week but said, “There’s a team in our state in another conference with a schedule that I would argue, if I played with our twos and threes, we could go undefeated, and they’ll probably make the CFP this year.”

At Big 12 spring meetings on Thursday, Texas Tech head coach Joey McGuire said he talked to the head coaches at Abilene Christian and Texas State — the respective Week 1 opponents for the Red Raiders and Longhorns — about buying out those contracts. In their place, Texas Tech could play Texas in Lubbock or at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, and Texas State and Abilene Christian could play each other.

“We can figure out if their twos and threes can win this conference,” McGuire said.

McGuire later confirmed to The Athletic that he did text both coaches at Abilene Christian and Texas State ahead of his comments. At least one of those coaches took it as tongue-in-cheek, according to another person familiar with the exchange.

Such a change is not expected to actually happen this late in the year, though Texas Tech officials would certainly welcome it.

Texas Tech plays Oregon State and Sam Houston to round out its nonconference schedule this season and avoids BYU and Utah in Big 12 play. The Red Raiders beat BYU twice last year en route to their first real conference championship since 1976. Texas hosts Ohio State in Week 2 after losing to the Buckeyes in Columbus to open the 2025 season.

The Texas Tech coach said fans can take shots at his team for losing 23-0 to Oregon in the College Football Playoff quarterfinals, or for losing 57-7 to Texas in Austin in 2023 — the Red Raiders did beat the Longhorns in Lubbock in 2022 — but Texas Tech has wanted to continue playing the Longhorns since Texas left the Big 12 for the SEC in 2024.

“I know he feels really good about his team and he’s making those comments, but man, we would love to play the University of Texas,” McGuire said.

Texas Tech board member and billionaire booster Cody Campbell echoed McGuire in a post on X, tagging Sarkisian and Texas athletic director Chris Del Conte.

McGuire also brought up recent comments this week from Del Conte that implied Texas’ 2028 and 2029 games against Notre Dame were only tentative.

“We’ll take that game (against Notre Dame) if they want to get out of it,” McGuire said.

Athletic director Kirby Hocutt told The Athletic that the school had conversations with Texas about continuing to play the Longhorns on an annual basis in several sports when Texas left for the SEC. Those talks fell off, but the Red Raiders would be willing to restart them at the drop of a hat.

As for Sarkisian’s dig at Texas Tech, Hocutt jokingly tossed one back about the Longhorns missing last year’s Playoff.

“We were in the CFP last year,” Hocutt said, “and I forget who Texas had in the first round last year.”