How about that Rick Barnes dude!

And here are a couple re-posts of stuff I wrote a couple months ago mostly contrasting the Penders experience with that for Barnes. Maybe it has some application to the current discussion

Question to anyone on this general topic
Qualifier -- you must be old enough to have been around for the Tom Penders Experience

I had more fun as a Texas fan under Penders than I did with our two subsequent coaches. Caveat - I will always give Barnes a hearty nod for giving us some top shelf NBA talent to follow (having Aldridge or Durant flash the Horns is always great). But the Penders' teams, for me, were a blast. They were exciting. Our games were legitimate events. This was true even though we rarely advanced. I remember a couple of the Penders tourney losses better than I do most of the Barnes wins.

In fact, I will go so far as saying that the closest second is actually the early Abe Lemons teams. Those teams were also a blast (up until the loss of Mike Wacker at least)

Am I alone on this? (it happens. no worries)​

-------------------------

That loss to Marshmello left me disappointed for a long time.

But in the 1990 run under Penders, the whole thing was exhilarating. I went to Dallas to see us beat the higher seeded Xavier (fabulous game - the one with the extended Blanks finger role) then lose to Piggy by 3. Even with as much as I hated Pig at the time, that loss still did not hurt as much as Syracuse. I felt really good about the whole thing.

Maybe it was as simple as the bias of lowered expectations? They were higher with Barnes so the early tourney losses hurt more. With Penders, we knew we were going to lose so it never hurt as much. (And, of course, with Lemons, there were zero expectations, so anything was gravy, lol). I think it's one of those things that however you want to look at it is however you are going look at it. These days, I feel like I have forsaken my dream that the Longhorns could become a national power in BBall. I used to think we could. Not anymore.​

 

Because Tennesse is not a good basketball program.

This is the WORST basketball analysis I have ever seen. If ANY of that mattered, Kansas, Duke and Villanova would not be basketball powers and UT & A&M would have some sort of basketball tradition outside of Rick Barnes. No wonder you are so down on him. Are you aware of the history of college basketball at either UT (or lack thereof). The fact is Rick Barnes has never been at a 1st tier basketball program. The best job he had was at our second tier program that only SEEMED first tier in the 2000s due to his coaching and over-achieving here (and yes, when you are better than every coach in program history, you over-achieved).

Actually, you can look up my posts on both firings. I said both were dumb at the time and time has proven I was right (although no one will admit it). The truth is our fanbase got spoiled in the 2000s and turned into fools obsessed with coaches’ quotes over results, subjective recruiting nonsense, and what idiots like Chip Brown and other foolish “insiders” have to say.

As proof of the large amount of fools that make up a good portion of our fanbase, I submit as Exhibit A, the soon to be deceased ShaggyTexas.com.

 

Touche!

 

Something that jumps out at me about this data set in Joe's post - look at what Rick accomplished prior to getting hired at Texas. Really not much. Chiefly, he made one Sweet 16 appearance in 10 seasons. 5 first round losses and 4 no NCAA. I'd say our standards have certainly changed and rightly so. Culturally, we've evolved into a program that CAN command a top tier coach. We shouldn't ever have to settle again.

I'd say Ricky from Hickory, if nothing else, left us better than he found us.

 

“Objection, evasion, joyous distrust, and love of irony are signs of health, everything absolute belongs to pathology.”
-- Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil
​

This was his third year there. How much patience do you have for him? This is not rhetoric, there is an answer. How many years before you would demand something better from him? I am asking that you state a number. A limit.
Unless you mean to say Barnes' usual one-and-done is good enough, given that Vol history, they dont deserve anything better? A sort of NCAA basketball purgatory.

 

agent,

Probably not many posters are aware of our history or what Deloss went through after Abe was fired. We were turned down by more coaches than the school had ever employed in all sports. It was so embarrassing that I personally told Deloss that I didn't give a **** who it was, where he had been, or what his record was, as long as he didn't turn us down. That is why I never bitched about Weltlich.

That said, Penders sparked some interest in basketball with his run n gun, put it up from anywhere offense. Hell, he even turned Frank's "tomb" into a soldout palace.

Barnes (a coach that turned down the UVA job) picked up the torch and took us to success not seen since the days of Slater Martin. Would I have liked more? Yes, but it was still better than all those before him. NOLA was fun, even if the game wasn't. What Barnes did this year, in that cesspool that is one of college athletics biggest embarrassments, is nothing short of miraculous. I can't understand the animosity toward him. He was never the arrogant ******* that Mackovic was, is, and always will be.

Thus far, I have seen nothing to justify Smart's salary, or to make me believe that he is even as good as Leon Black, a man who stepped aside and continued to serve The University for many years. Neither have I seen anything to make me believe that Smart is capable of taking this program back to the level of a Tom Penders much less Rick Barnes.

Leon earned his money

Abe earned his money

Tom earned his money

Rick earned his money

Shaka Smart should be embarrassed every payday with his overwhelming lack of accomplishments. The rest on the list, not so much.

 

He was hired to elevate this program into that next tier. He failed. Pretty simple.

That's because you were wrong about all of it. Mack Brown got lazy and let his assistants get lazy. Look no further than his latter years recruiting. His last full class in 2013 had a lot of known names from online ranking services but it was a total disaster. Something we still feel today. Even the exalted 2010 class, which some called the best Texas class since schollie limits (I kid not) was a disaster. My memory is that we only had one guy drafted (and he was a 6th year senior) from that entire greatest class ever. Why? How? Because Mack and his assistants were not willing to put in the work to get to know, scout and investigate the players. They were making offers from the golf course. And we still have not recovered from the QB choices he made in those latter years. Dreadful.

I dont know man. The "everyone is an idiot but me" position is never a good look. And Shaggy did not really die. It just moved to a different server, under a different name. And, even if it had, the way in which that site owner lost his site had nothing to do with the level and quality of the information and opinions posted there. That's a silly claim.

 

I didn't make the Final Four but was in SA for the Sweet 16 vs UConn (w/Emeka Okafor and Ben Gordon) and the Elite 8 vs. Michigan St.

I can say that Barnes flat out-coached Jim Calhoun and Tom Izzo in both of those games. Texas was not a particularly flashy team but we had 4 juniors and TJ (soph.) that just gelled like crazy. We were so deep and athletic, and we were well coached. Rick will always have special place in my heart for that run. Always.

Also of note: UT was the only #1 seed to make the final four that year.

 

-Our school had 16 NCAA tournament appearances in the 60 years of the NCAA Tournament prior to Rick Barnes. Rick Barnes had 15 tournament appearances in his 16 years here. He made making the NCAA Tournament an expectation for our school.

-Rick Barnes took us to our first final four since 1947. That is 56 years! In fact, Rick Barnes taking Texas to the 2003 Final Four is the only time in the past 34 years a school in this state has been to the final four! (prior to that it was U of H in 1984). I will also add that when we last went to the final four before Barnes, college basketball was segregated and an entirely different landscape.

-Barnes accounts for 3 of our 7 Elite Eight appearances. Rick Barnes accounts for 3 out of our 4 Elite Eight appearance since 1950.

-Barnes accounts for 5 of our 10 sweet sixteen appearances.

-Barnes is our all time winningest coach and it is not even close.

-Rick Barnes produced 19 NBA players at UT in 16 seasons. The NBA was founded in 1946. In the 51 seasons prior to Rick Barnes, UT produced 12 NBA players. Of those 12, only 3 players (LaSalle Thompson, Johnny Moore, and Slater Martin) played 4 or more seasons in the NBA. Rick Barnes has so far had 15 players (Mihm, Evans, Ford, Ivey, Aldridge, Tucker, Gibson, Durant, Augustin, Bradley, James, Pittman, Thompson, Hamilton, and Joseph) play 4 or more seasons!

(Credit to Shaka, he has managed to keep our recruiting going. That was one of the things I was most worried about since no one has basically ever recruited top talent here outside of Abe Lemons and Rick Barnes).

-Barnes won 3 Big 12 titles, the most of any non-Kansas coach.

Texas is a second rate program. The only reason you think Texas is any good is because of Rick Barnes and to a lesser extent Penders. Barnes single-handily elevated our second rate program to seeming like it could be a first rate program due to his coaching and recruiting.

Our fans do not care about basketball. We have no tradition and barely any history since segregation ended beyond Rick Barnes. We are in a state that does not care and does not have ANY national titles other than the one UTEP won due to the era of desegregation. Hell a few years ago not a single team from this state even made the tournament.

Barnes just took over a massive dumpster fire at Tennessee and won their first conference title in 10 years. Taking a less talented third rate program that only ever won anything when they had Freddy Flintstone (Bruce Pearl) cheating there and getting to the second round of the NCAA Tournament in year 3 is results, especially when he lost to final four team he had the misfortune of being matched up against in the second round.

A subjective opinion.

The three years after Brown and Barnes speak for themselves. What is a bad look is the hardheadedness of looking at those three years and sticking with your proven wrong opinion.

If you are doing better than anyone in the history of your program, what is there better to demand? Demanding national titles at Texas or Tennessee is absurd. I hope we have a coach that can one day do better than Rick Barnes. I do not know that I or anyone currently alive will live to see that, but I hope it happens.

Texas basketball is not Texas football or baseball, and I mean the State of Texas, not just UT. I honestly do not know if this state will ever seriously be on the level of the basketball blue bloods as far as consistent final fours go. If we get a coach on par with Penders, Barnes or better, we should never fire them.

Also yes, tradition and school culture do matter in basketball. Tradition and culture are why Kansas lures elite coaches, gets elite recruits and wins. "We're Texas" does not mean tiddlywinks in basketball, just like the name "Kansas" does not mean tiddlywinks in football. The only reasons you think it does are Rick Barnes and to a lesser extent Penders.

PS: Shoutout to Abe Lemons. He may not be the most successful or best coach in school history, but he will probably always be the fan favorite. I do not know how far he would have gotten us, but I like to believe he could have elevated us to a second rate program sooner if he had not been fired.

 

I think it’s going to take a coach bigger than the game; bigger than the school and the program to outlast the second fiddle politics and the weak fan base. Thankfully we still have room at the table because we’ve never won a NC in basketball here - and that legacy is just waiting for someone to come here and own it. The only sport I think the university can’t celebrate. It’s going to require a bit of magic; a complete surprise - a combination of the right veteran players, new recruits, a micky D’s, All American, that one assistant, that perfect pivotal road series where we earn a single digit ranking and ride it to a top tourney seed, all stars aligned. Head coach will be somebody completely unpredictable. Somebody we’d never anticipate would come here, or some upstart that we’d never think would thrive here if they even made sense. And they’ll just pull it all together and just make that magical run. And we’re going to have a big Hornfans party and I’m gonna throw it. And caryhorn is going to bring the tequila!

Alas what is the correlation with the success of major sports at major market schools in big conferences? Generally the good football schools do not produce good basketball and/or baseball schools; consistently throughout history. And certainly not ever within the same calendar year. With the exception of 4 schools who have won a MNC in all 3 big sports; Ohio St., Florida, Michigan, UCLA. How is It we can’t be as good as these guys?

 

Barnes was a hot commodity coming out of the ACC at the time. Including his famous/infamous confrontation with Dean Smith.

 

Yet also just described the program as second tier, or even second rate

 

These years speak to the state of the programs at the time those people were fired, their replacements and the decision-making ability of the person(s) in charge of choosing the replacements.
It's a logical fallacy to make a positive assumption how Barnes/Brown would have fared had they remained

 

I had a feeling you would refuse to answer the question

 

The results of Mack Brown's last several recruiting classes are in the books now. They were failures. This is factual.
Why and how it happened might be subject to different interpretation but the fact that they were overrated and set the program back is not.

 

I did answer. Continue to do better than your predecessors. That is an answer.

If college sports were only about recruiting, Charlie Strong would not have lost to Kansas.

Mack Brown messed up in going away from the spread and hiring Manny Diaz. He did miss on QBs. He also had bad luck with injuries. However, at the end, with Applewhite/Greg Robinson, 2014 would have been a lot better than 6-7. Also, if it was truly only about the players being bad, 2014 would not have been Strong’s best team. I can 100% say that Brown would have done better than Strong. I can also say Barnes would have done more with the 2015-16 team and would not have gone 11-22.

Yes, the evidence supports that Brown & Barnes are better than Strong & Smart and would have done better.

 

lol that's a true statement

even though i agree with most of htown's stuff. rick did improve our program.

still, he wasn't a world burner the first few years. i wouldn't compare rick barnes first few years that much more favorably than shaka's first few years. barnes did better, but not extremely. "making the tournament, then losing" shouldn't be an accomplishment if you are making as much money as our coaches make. what are you, a Top 40/Top 50 team if you make the tournament. i'm sorry, but that's not an impressive feat. i thought that about barnes too.

a coach is responsible for the depth of the program. this has been shaka's weakness (and the marginal offense) so far imo. one player's illness is not an excuse for a lack of depth.

barnes did a pretty good job with what he had. i like him as a ball coach. he wasn't awesome.

 

Of course he did. But that was not the actual original issue, only what they later made the issue so they could more easily deal with it. Happens all the time.

 

Texas Football
2010: 5-7
2011: 8-5
2012: 9-4
2013: 8-5
Total: 30-21

2014: 6-7
2015: 5-7
2016: 5-7
2017: 7-6
Total: 23-27

Texas Basketball:
2012-13: 16-18
2013-14: 24-11
2014-15: 20-14
Total: 60-43

2015-16: 20-13
2016-17: 11-22
2017-18: 19-15
Total: 50-50

With both fires I said on this message board that history of collegs sports is clear that you do not fire proven winners because you almost always end up with a worse coach. Usually, it takes at least two coaches to recover.

I said that firing Mack Brown was a bad move in 2013 as there were not any good hires available and history was clear we would end up with a “butt coach” (exact words of my prediction) before he was fired.

I said in 2014 firing Barnes was a mistake because it was not clear anyone could come here and do any better. Admittedly, after the Shaka hire, I did think we got someone that could at least match Barnes (or Penders). So far my pre Shaka hire belief that we would be worse off has been correct.

So majority in 2013 and 2014: “we likely will be better of without Brown or Barnes.”
Htown 77 in 2013 and 2014: “we will likely be worse off.”
What happened: We are worse off. The numbers do not lie.

Of course I was also aware at the time that Bill Powers was a boob who would not try and hire the best available coaches.

Also, one last truth, Rick Barnes took over a worse Tennessee program at the time and has them in better shape three years later and has done more than Texas. Shaka Smart took over a better Texas program at that time and three years later has Texas in worse shape and has done less than Tennessee.

 

I can't argue with most of what you say. I don't recall many saying we would be better off without them, but I do recall many basically saying it was time for them to go as the programs were headed downhill. You and a few others did say be careful what you ask for because the other options might be worse. We never know for sure how a coach is going to perform here. All we know is the past and neither of our hires had a solid past performance so we gambled and in my opinion lost on both.

It was and still is my opinion that you can't not make a change until you have a sure thing because I dont believe there is a sure thing. Let's see how Aggy feels about their sure thing in five years. Maybe they'll win a title by then, but maybe they'll still be the conference door mat.

 

There is no “sure thing.” However you can evaluate where you are at and how good the potential hires are (and if you have the proper leadership to make the best hiring decisions). I, for one, do not know if Jimbo will succeed or not, and either way he was definitely overpaid, but after firing a winning coach, the aggies (for once) DID try to go get the best coach possible. If the aggies were going to fire Sumlin for maybe Chad Morris, then it would have been a really questionable move.

Our problem was in 2013 we were late in the game and it was a bad year to hire (as I said in 2013). With the lack of great candidates out there, it was high risk low chance of reward... unless you believe we could have gotten Saban. I do not believe that was ever realistic, but maybe it was and the leadership still screwed the pooch.

With Barnes, again, we are not a great program and it going to take a rare special coach to elevate us further. I thought we were better of sticking with Barnes until he retired as he proved he could put a final 4 team together, elite 8 teams together and recruit Keven Durant type players. There was no need to go take the huge risk and likely get worse as long as we had a coach that would keep us competitive and give us a shot at winning it all. As I said before, I did think Smart, when he was hired, would be a lot better. Of course, as many have stated, we all also thought he would bring havoc here, which would at least keep us on Pender’s level.

Smart has done better than Strong and is about on par with Herman’s first season, yet he seems somehow more disappointing to me than the others. I think because none of us were expecting the offense to be worse than Barnes’s offense (which I freely admit was his weakness).

 

I heard from someone close to Alabama athletics that Saban was in fact going to do the deal for $100M but he insisted on complete secrecy until it was finalized so he could transition the way he wanted. Obviously that term/number got leaked, so, he balked. For $100M I would have tattooed it on my forehead. Not sure about Saban’s methods or if that’s even credible information, but interesting to contemplate nonetheless.

 

First of all, this is a good discussion. Thanks for the thoughtful posts.

I think that both Mack Brown and Rick Barnes were remarkable hires and took the programs as far as either sport realistically could hoped to have gone in their times here—especially given what had come before. That isn’t inconsistent with saying that at the time each was let go, given all facts and plots and momentums involved, it was time to move on. However, because of the rareness of each man, and the raised expectations each created, it is logically more of a long-shot to replace him with an equally rare, much less superior, hire. Not impossible, but not guaranteed by any means. So, the underperformance of Charles Strong or Shaka Smart does not really prove or disprove whether changing when we did was the right thing.

 

I'll admit that, even though Mack and Rick did amazing things here, I always wanted their weaknesses to be eliminated for a "perfect coach". Mack giving talent more opportunity over his upperclassmen, Rick allowing players to score with less defense. In the end, they took Texas to the pinnacle of their respective sports, and should (especially by me) be remembered for their outstanding achievements.

 

Pre Final Four College Gameday just showed the top 10 ncaa tournament buzzer beaters. Guess which one was on the list?

Seeing that footage and seeing 3 of our players standing flat footed deer in headlights while N. Iowa just gets an easy lob in to a guy who moves undefended into open space to get an uncontested wide open shot....reminds me of why I think Smart sucks.