As head football coach at Texas Tech University, “I recruited (Patrick Mahomes) … I’ve got to be very good friends with him.”

Ahead of Super Bowl 2025, one politician’s claim about recruiting Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes prompted some people to throw a metaphorical penalty flag on the play.

On her eponymous podcast’s Feb. 3 episode, former Fox News host Megyn Kelly asked Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., whether he would root for the Kansas City Chiefs to defeat the Philadelphia Eagles during the Feb. 9 championship game. 

“So, does this mean, since you used to coach Patrick Mahomes, that you’re rooting for the Chiefs at the big game this Sunday?” Kelly asked. Tuberville spent 40 years as a college football coach — including at Mahomes’ alma mater Texas Tech University — before becoming a U.S. senator. 

With a smile, Tuberville gently corrected Kelly. 

“Well, I never even coached him,” he said. “What happened is — I recruited him. And then I left and went to another school. But I’ve got to be very good friends with him. He’s a good — not just a good athlete. He’s a very good example for a lot of our young youth across this country.”

But Tuberville’s attempt to clarify was more of a fumble.

“He did not recruit me at the time,” Mahomes said during a Feb. 6 press conference in response to a question about whether he had any relationship with Tuberville. “I don’t — I don’t remember if I ever got to meet him or not.”

We contacted Tuberville’s office and received no reply.

Tuberville was Texas Tech’s head football coach from 2010 to 2012, three full seasons. He resigned as head coach Dec. 8, 2012. 

Mahomes played for Texas Tech from 2014 to 2016, before the NFL’s Kansas City Chiefs drafted him in 2017. 

News reports credit Tuberville’s successor, Kliff Kingsbury, with recruiting Mahomes. 

In 2022, ESPN reported that Kingsbury first noticed Mahomes in 2012, when Kingsbury was Texas A&M University’s offensive coordinator and Mahomes was a student-athlete at Whitehouse High School in East Texas. Then, when Kingsbury became Texas Tech’s head football coach, he prioritized recruiting Mahomes, ESPN reported. 

“We went after him hard and knew that we needed to get him,” Kingsbury told ESPN in 2022. 

Mahomes said Kingsbury taught him a lot and helped him become the player he is now, according to Arrowhead Pride, a website that writes about the Chiefs.

“(Texas Tech was) really the first and only,” Mahomes said, according to Arrowhead Pride. “I didn’t get recruited by (many schools); I got a couple other offers from smaller schools in the Texas area … I credit Kingsbury, because he was the one who came down and saw me, talked to me, talked to my family and believed in me. That’s the reason I’m in this position — because he gave me a chance.”

President Donald Trump also has falsely said that Tuberville coached Mahomes.

Our ruling

Tuberville said as head football coach at Texas Tech, he “recruited” Mahomes and the two got to be “good friends.” 

Mahomes said Tuberville “did not recruit me,” and added that he wasn’t certain he’d ever met Tuberville.  

Tuberville’s time as Texas Tech University’s head football coach didn’t overlap with Mahomes’ time on the team. In news reports, Mahomes has credited Kingsbury, Tuberville’s Texas Tech successor, with recruiting him. 

We rate this claim False.

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