How BYU and Texas Tech teamed up for a good cause before the Big 12 championship game

ARLINGTON, Texas — Before every BYU road football game this season, Cougar fans have rallied together for various charitable causes at BYU’s Cougs Care alumni tailgates.

There have been book drives, food drives and clothing drives, spanning from Arizona all the way to East Carolina. Communities have been served, individuals and families have been blessed and BYU’s motto of “enter to learn, go forth to serve” has been displayed in many different ways.

Ahead of Saturday’s ultra important Big 12 championship game between BYU and Texas Tech, however, Cougar Nation took part in its most elaborate service effort of the season — with help from the Red Raiders faithful.

“The way we view it is, this is the biggest BYU football game ever with so much on the line,“ said Taggart Barron, the president of BYU’s Alumni Association Dallas/Fort Worth chapter. ”So we needed a tailgate to match it.”

Thus, the BYU Alumni Association rented out Globe Life Field in Arlington — the home of Major League Baseball’s Texas Rangers — to host the tailgate festivities Friday night, with activities, Cougar Tails and plenty of other features for fans to enjoy in advance of Saturday’s contest.

But BYU’s alumni tailgates aren’t just all fun and games — the school loves to refer to them as “parties with a purpose.”

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For the first Power Four conference championship game in school history, BYU planned a four-part service initiative to begin prior to the tailgate and conclude well after the game’s end:

• A food drive was organized on behalf of Arlington Charities, largest provider of supplemental food in the city.
• Two Light the World Giving Machines were placed right in between BYU and Texas Tech’s respective fan events Friday night in Arlington — BYU was at Globe Life Field, while Texas Tech was in the same complex at Texas Live.
• The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints arranged for a truckload of 36,000 pounds of food to be sent out and donated between two local food banks in conjunction with BYU’s tailgate.
• The week following the championship game, BYU will send out 4,300 gallons of BYU Creamery milk to two other local food pantries who are currently low on milk supply.

Additionally, the Arlington Charities food drive was planned as a joint project with Texas Tech, and the Red Raiders would promote the Giving Machines on social media as well to encourage their fans to visit them.

This isn’t the first time Texas Tech and BYU have teamed up for a good cause this year. When the Cougars visited Lubbock in November, the Cougs Care tailgate collaborated with Texas Tech for a book drive to support a local literacy group. Patrick Mahomes and Andy Reid even appeared in a short online advertisement together to spread the word on behalf of their respective alma maters.

“They’ve been really enthusiastic,” Barron said of Texas Tech’s involvement. “They helped a lot with the (Cougs Care) book drive in Lubbock (on Nov. 8), and they’re helping us again here. It’s great to team up with them in a friendly way.”

For Texas Tech’s alumni and fans, getting involved with BYU’s service plans in Arlington was a “no-brainer,” according to Zach Hall, the president of Texas Tech’s Alumni Association Dallas chapter.

“We were just really excited to get on board with this, promote it and help make it happen,” Hall said. “I’ve been in awe watching (BYU’s service projects) every game, whether it was in Lubbock a few weeks ago or with the Cincinnati food bank a few weeks ago, I’ve been very impressed.

“... It’s a respectful rivalry. Both great teams, both great fan bases, and at the end of the day, both of us just want to do good.”

Before BYU’s tailgate had even begun on Friday, more than 700 pounds of food had been donated to Arlington Charities by fans of the Cougars and Red Raiders.

With Friday’s donations at the fan events, the overall total “easily” surpassed 1,000 pounds, according to Arlington Charities development director Heather Lowe.

“We’ve been absolutely blown away this week,” said Lowe. “... I don’t think we had any idea at the scale or the scope of this thing, it’s just been really incredible. All of this is going to have an immediate positive impact on the community. We’re going to be able to get this out to the families that need it, and it’s just really exciting.

“... We have a lot of neighbors in need, and we do our best to get our food out to them in a variety of ways. This is going to be a real blessing for the holidays.

“You would think that teams who are going to be playing each other, are automatically going to be fierce rivals, but to come together and collaborate on something that not necessarily even benefits their own local communities, but benefits the local community here where they’re playing, is just really special, really generous and we appreciate it so much.”