5. 2008
Head coach: Mike Leach
Record: 11-2
Mumme indeed carried his Air Raid vision from the Texas high school ranks to Iowa Wesleyan and everywhere else in his career. And his right-hand man for a lot of that journey brought it to fruition in a single play.
When Leach arrived in Lubbock in 2000, Texas Tech was in a bit of a rut: The Red Raiders had won between five and seven games in eight of the nine previous years. His gunslinging offense fit West Texas like a glove, and after a pair of seven-win seasons, he would win at least eight in each of his final eight years on the job. (Tech has won eight games only four times in the 14 years since he left.)
The peak came in 2008. With a four-star quarterback (Graham Harrell) throwing to the best receiver in the country (Michael Crabtree), Tech began the season 10-0 and moved to No. 2 in the AP poll after a classic upset of top-ranked Texas. The Red Raiders lost two of their final three to slip to 12th, but this season provided a new level of proof of concept for the Air Raid offense. So many of its concepts have become part of the generic college football offense in the years that have followed, and that's an incredible thing to say considering its counter-culture thinking and small-town start.