Too early to say on Shaka either way, but Barnes won an NCAA Tournament game in 2013-14 and Shaka last won one in 2012-13. Shaka also has one total Sweet 16 appearance. Barnes has 6 sweet sixteens, 3 elite 8s and 3 Big 12 regular season titles (the most of any non Kansas coach). Smart has lost to a double digit lower seed in the first round of the tournament 3 years in a row at Texas and VCU.
Tennessee was in bad shape with Barnes being their third coach in three years when he took over (previous coach was fired for NCAA violations). If we played Tennessee tomorrow, we would lose. It will be interesting to see who wins an NCAA tournament game first. Barnes at an inferior Tennessee program or Smart at Texas. Anyway, time will tell.
I will also add we had much better defense under Barnes and Barnes had plays drawn up for the end of the game. We just seem to throw the ball up and sometimes it goes in (OU) and sometimes it does not (a lot of other times). Of course, that may not be Shaka, that may have been the players. I have a hard time imagining Shaka tells them to run around like fools and do something dumb on the last few possessions of the game. As discussed in other threads, the problem may have been more they were not listening or having a problem player. We'll see how they grow and what the case is over the next three seasons.
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Last edited: Jan 29, 2017