Texas Basketball Fans Are Over Rick Barnes

Snide – totally agree about Ford starting the run.

I rarely post here or elsewhere on football, basketball, baseball or other UT sports matters, but I sincerely believe the problem with this year’s basketball team’s lack of fan support has nothing to do with Barnes, one-and-done, the team, the players, LHN or anything else other than we as an alumni and student fan base simply suck. I came to Austin/UT in ‘76, and witnessed Coach Royal’s last year as a coach. I’ve had season football, basketball and baseball tickets forever, and the reality is that the numbers of hardcore, zealous fans is shrinking-whether due to age, wealth, the 10% rule or the iPhone(or solar storms). We suck in quantity, quality, dedication, willingness to make fools out of ourselves and to enjoy(however we each choose) being ardent fans of the school we supposedly love unquestionably. I hate aggie with a passion, but a healthy dose of unquestioned dumb love, devotion and hair-on-fire craziness from an increasing number of folks might be what is really needed in all sports. I need Tequila or a bottle of vino tinto to get me where I used to be as fan when W. L. Weller would suffice, but I am ready to recommit to support UT sports and its programs like i used to in days gone by. Who else is in? Hook ’em.

There are two sports at UT:
Football and Spring Football.

Absolut, I’m pretty sure you just accurately described the normal aging process for 90% of the populace. Generating fan enthusiasm will continue to be a challenge in an evolving world where technology brings people more entertainment options every day. This is particularly true in down years, which we’re having a run of.

But just based on the number of people posting on a non-game night in late January, there’s no shortage of people who are passionate about all things burnt orange. Cheers, and Hook ’Em.

We get some of the Longhorn games on the East Coast but they’re unwatchable for large stretches. When they are on tv though, I agree with other posts in that I’d have more of a desire to be there.

Put me in the “blame the LHN” camp. I think I’ve seen about 3 games this year. (To be fair, I was unable to watch a couple of ESPN, etc. games.) Usually I’ve seen about 15-18 games by now. I’m still trying to figure out if I like Julien Lewis or Sheldon McClellan better. I’m used to knowing that I like Craig Winder better than JD Lewis because Winder can go left, and I usually know something like that by the first week of December.

I live in Dallas, I’m busy with my career, and so I don’t go to many games anyway, but I doubt I’ll be at any this year. If I lived in Austin, I’m not sure how many games I’d go to because I just wouldn’t be able to develop any familiarity with the team. From what I’ve seen, this is a likable team that plays its ass off. But being disappointed that Texas fans (with all that they bring—and dont bring—to the table) aren’t as fired up about this team as they have about others is like being disappointed that a prude chick won’t go home with you after two drinks at a bar.

I’m sure recrnt late-season disappointments play a role, but if I had to put a percentage on it, I’d attribute lack of interest 80% to LHN and no publicity.

I’m a student and I’ve been going since 2009. Honestly, we’ve never had a good fan base at basketball. The student section is mediocre most nights and the rest of the crown is truly awful. Even the last two years when we were ranked so highly, we only sold out games for OU and aTm, I believe. With that being said, I’m excited for this team, because I think it’s going to be one of Rick’s best teams once everyone pans out.

I decided to go the Kansas game at the last minute. Some guy saw me and Mrs V standing in line about to buy tickets and offered us two free tix in the arena near mid court that he wasn’t using “as long as we yelled when he did.” Cool dude. $100 tix fell in our hands out of nowhere. THIS WAS MEANT TO BE…

Or so I thought.

After watching us piss away a second straight winnable game against a top ten team on the final possession, I was fucking distraught after J’Covan’s shot hit the rim.

It was then I realized maybe I’m not like most Texas basketball fans. Everywhere around me I saw perfectly happy folks clad in burnt orange ho-humming their way up the steps, showing no sign of frustration at this loss whatsoever, gladhanding KU fans, who moments prior had gotten self righteously pissed off at being down by four and we’re now strutting their beaks all over the FEC. We weren’t supposed to be in this game but the fact we had played well enough to actually win and shit the bed two games in a row on the last few possessions caused a slow burn.

I get it. It’s a young team. They don’t know how to win close games yet. But for some reason my expectations are having trouble getting re-calibrated despite starting 18 freshmen coached by a guy who has never known the term “positive reinforcement”. Maybe Huckleberry can chart the diminishing returns of berating a player after every fucking time out, missed shot, commercial break; or conversely, the perfectly executed pick and roll, fast break layup, kickout for three — whether it’s a good play or bad, Rick has something to bitch about. To Nobis’ point above, the dictator act has certainly gotten old.

Rick has always been a tough coach. But I also remember him joking around with TJ Ford, James Thomas, Darren Kelly, Freddie Mitchell, Brandon Mouton, DJ Augustin, and Kevin Durant during the games. Something happened in the last few years that took the joy out of coaching for Rick Barnes. Maybe it was babysitting J’Covan Brown and Jordan Hamilton. Maybe it was losing guys to the NBA early year after year, compromising his best laid recruiting plans. Or two straight late season collapses in a row. Or elbow surgery. Or all of the above.

This team was behind the eight ball from day one given it’s youth, but that didn’t stop me from thinking we could still compete in the upper third of what is a relatively weak Big 12. This is a solid Jayhawk squad but certainly not a Kansas team for the ages. Mizzou is the best team in the league because of its experience, guard play, and efficiency. Scott Drew has sold his soul to buy a disparate collection of elite talent to Baylor that will continue to tease and ultimately disappoint because he can’t coach against his elite peers. It’s a big drop off after KU, MU, and BU. The Okie teams are down. Iowa State is a one man team that we lost to on the road and barely beat at home despite carrying a double digit lead most of the game. A&M sucks sheep taint. Texas is still young and inconsistent. Texas Tech still wishes it had Bobby Knight. And Mike Leach. And Spike Dykes…

Even if we sneak our way into the NCAA tournament, and that will be a hell of an accomplishment, this isn’t a team built to last. Next year, for the nth year in a row, we bring in some talented freshmen to blend with a collection of recruiting hits (McClellan, Lewis) and misses (Sterling Gibbs) and assuming he isn’t deluded by an agent promising lottery pick riches, the lone senior in J’Covan Brown, who I expect to set a Texas record for shot attempts in a season, beating the record he’ll set this year.

What isn’t arriving is an elite, once-in-a-decade guard that can trump all the odds and run the point like Ford or Augustin. If Kabongo keeps improving throughout the season as I suspect he will, I think he bolts early just like Cory Joseph and this run of mediocrity continues into 2013.

How is our baseball team looking this year?

I’m jaded, but I also believe Austin itself is to blame for what ails us as fans and sports teams. We and our players(and coaches) enjoy a wealth of ready distractions that are unrivaled in most college towns. We have many options for seeking personal enjoyment that pull us, individually and collectively, from the more basic and necessary tasks at hand-regular attendance and active participation by fans and absolute commitment to team and self preparation by players and coaches.

I fail to see what is so hard about winning.

I have no idea whether I am unique in this, but the “one and done” elite player system that has developed in college basketball has cooled me on the entire sport gradually over the last 5-10 years. Seeing (mostly) a new team of starters for most major teams each year makes it less interesting to me. You don’t get to watch the elite players grow and develop, nor do you see the team gel as a unit.

Plus it just seems so much more dirty and cynical than college football.

I agree with 95% of the comments made on this thread. Just so you do not think that my head is not up where the sun does not shine.

I only follow college basketball, so burn me on a stake, but I have the good fortune to travel all over the country on my job.
 I see basketball on the East coast, Down Florida way , West Coast and the Midwest ,I have seen most kids playing in their home gyms and playgrounds .
I see kids progress from AAU 15 and up to college. My wife made a list of the games and showcases and they added up to hundreds of them.

 I hear kids talk about Texas not as a destination but a place where you have to play defense and do it by Barnes book. I also suspect and heard that a lot of agents, people of interest say that Texas is a hard place to shine. That players lose their edge because Texas does not play good Basketball. That players have to stop being players and just play ball Texas way.
 I suspect that recent players have heard this and decided that one and gone was more then enough. This just sitting listening in the stands and hotel bars, talking to kids and just listening to the street agents talking players and schools.

The 5* and some 4* are players that have skills in a lot of areas most on the offense part that are important to them, future NBA stars. The kids stop being free and easy and stop playing like a player. Player make plays and are considered players.

 Does Barnes play to his teams/players great skills or does he make them conform and do it his way and to his half court system?
 I think that is self defeating and a possible reason kids leave early. Why did Durant have to create his own shot?
I do believe kids need to grow into a team but they usually reflect the coach on the bench.
We wonder why Avery, Joseph, Gibson and others left early. Maybe they thought that their stock would drop the longer they stayed. Texas does not develop kids. That is IMO.
This team does play hard but it lacks leadership and direction from the bench to the court.

Build support for our team? Open and make it easy for the fans to get to know the players.Barnes needs to promote his teams good/ bad or indifferent. Answer Questions about the game and not speak “coach speak”.
Stop throwing his players under that bus in public do that in practice and in the office. Barnes is making changes ,slow and slower but making them. Lets hope this turns around and we start getting 1 or 2 top Texas high school players.

I hope Patron was clear as he dictated this flawed opinion to me.

If we are 18-1 at this point of the season – they will come! If we are a consistant winner (ala Kansas) year after year – they will always come. If we actually play for a natty, once in a while, you won’t get a ticket for less than $300.

We win, the closet fans will come out!

skymonkey horn, were describing Rick Barnes or Bob Knight. I couldn’t tell the difference.

I was laughed at online when I first made this comment but during the 2009-2010 season Barnes was spending A LOT of time with Knight.

Co-sign Nobis’ post. He really did nail it. Sums up how a lot of us feel I think.

From this point forward, right or wrong, I think the perception of Rick will be that even if things start going really well, he’ll find a way to screw it up in the end. And it will take at least one strong tourney run to beat that back. There’s just a lack of faith.

Only if Barnes had the success Knight had! Barnes is challenged offensively, but the fact of the matter is, as Scip pointed out, he is the winningest coach in Texas history. This doesn’t speak volumes but his overall record does. Do we wish he had performed better in the tourney? Of course, but people seem to forget that Jim Boeheim’s team’s struggled for many years. Believe me I saw them up close as I had brothers at Georgetown all through the 80’s.

Perhaps Gibson left early because he wasn’t a true point guard, but I saw players get better with my own eyes. Jordan Hamilton anyone? His overall game improved. And let me tell you defense, rebounding, passing, etc are all still part of the game despite what sportscenter tells us or what a street agent might say. I believe Coach K’s teams still play fundamental basketball and he’s the greatest coach of all time. Do people remember Dexter Pittman and Royal Ivey? It’s ludicrous to say players have not gotten better under Barnes. Hell Augustin got better with each year.

I can’t explain why players have left early, but Bradley and Avery would have been best served to stay in school to work on their games and open themselves up to instruction. Texas fans are generally apathetic about basketball which makes it that much more remarkable the job Barnes has done. Does he have shortcomings? Sure, but he needs an experienced backcourt. I think this post would not even exist had Texas beaten Arizona in the tourney last year or if Thompson had come back for his soph year. The expectations were very low for this team, but for some reason I still think they go on a run and make the tourney.

Just quick question, JCB is a junior, right? Are we to believe Brown is going to leave early after this season? Figured only seniors would be headed out – Wangmene and Chapman – with the possible departure of Kabongo (although I’d hope he’d realize he could work his way into the lottery with 1 more year in Austin).

Great comments on a well-written article. Fans have “tolerated” Barnes’ coaching philosophy as long as it has meant winning and posting strong results. However, it’s hard to see Barnes’ philosophy meshing well with the elite recruits that he’s been getting, starting with KD. These kids aren’t used to the hardline narrative that Barnes uses on in the practice gym, on the court, and in the post-game media. To some extent, he has to find a happy medium between the hard-nosed, gritty attitude and a #1-fan mentality to get the most out of these kids. It’s great that all these guys come back and talk about how much Barnes helped them to achieve their dream of playing in the NBA, but why can’t we see this same thing being said regularly while they’re still at Texas?

In the current climate of college basketball, specifically in the era of one-and-done, it’s hard for Texas fans to see schools with top quality freshman either excel with youth (Kentucky) or manage to lure these kids back in for a title run (Baylor, UNC, Ohio St). You have to wonder if trying to recruit elite level talent is the right move in his system. His best teams have featured true blue collar rosters with a single elite player (TJ and the junior 4, DJ and the crew).

I can’t comment on fan attendance and what not because I am a diehard Longhorn in every respect. I never missed a basketball game while roaming the 40 Acres between 2000-2004. And I’ve only missed 1 basketball game on TV (the Okie St thriller) since graduating (damn power outage in the North Carolina area that I was living at the time). I can’t relate to the casual fan. I don’t take losses this year with the “oh well, we are just young” because I actually really like this year’s team. It’s a cast of young guys who are grinding out there, trying to get better each night, trying to find anyway to win a game. And to me, this team is the epitome of what’s been missing the past several years under Barnes. While it’s frustrating to think that we are probably 1 player away this year from being really good, it does present the possibility that what’s to come will be outstanding.

Our offense is so bad though. It’s easy to defend just guard the guy in front of you at the top of the key. A wing runs around a screen on the perimeter and the bigs set picks for each other. Someone needs to drive in an dish out or take it and draw a foul. But we wait till the shot clock runs down an jack up a three or contested shot. We left yesterday with 8 minutes left it was just so painful to watch. No offensive plan it’s just so simple and easy to get bogged down. I think we are on the right path though. Unlike other sports this is the best we can do I believe. This is the one sport the coach gets a complete pass in.

A lot of great stuff on this post. I don’t have anything new to add, and will in fact repost something I posted in another discussion in the last day or two, with a slight amendment.

For me, watching the Horns is like watching Sisyphus while sitting next to Damocles.

I walked away from watching the KU game when we were down by about a dozen in the 2nd half. Came back later to see we were leading, but walked away again because I had this sick feeling that we’d blow the game on a poorly handled and/or designed offensive play in the final possessions. This is now the expectation.

The other expectation if for J’Covan and Myck to leave after this season, and watch us struggle again next season at PG as we break in a new floor commander.

It would be easier for me to watch the team if we had any freaking way to win a close game in the last minute of play.

When you basically coach no effective offensive system, no specific team moves to win a close game in the last few seconds, you lose. And no matter how many games we lose exactly because of this, it doesn’t change.

Re low attendance…we need a real basketball arena, build it and they will come.

Re Barnes’ coaching…I believe he does fine, considering how young his teams are…I believe he really needs the chance to show his coaching chops with an older team…but, therein lies the rub, can he recruit and retain that kinda kid? Looks to me like he is trying less for the one-and-done with most of this year’s recruits as well as last year’s with the exception of Kobongo. Good move IMHO.

Re unanimated fans at the game…see my first point above. Same problem for the most part.

Re the LHN…I do believe its lack of availability has hurt our fan interest level…and, too bad, because the LHN puts on a quality product…don’t know what to do bout getting off the snide, but I hope someone somewhere with authority has this high on their to-do list.

Sorry, I didn’t read all the posts, but the reason I don’t get excited about this team is because they play terrible basketball. Excruciating to watch at times. 62-55 against Iowa St? Halftime scores of 27-24, consistently? Balls bouncing off guys’ faces and toes. It;‘s not good hoops. No offense doesn’t always equal good hoops, but sheesh.

Due to a health issue, I’ve watched alot of college basketball this year and its clear to me that there is a huge difference between our student fan base and that of most other schools. Even school like Georgia and Michigan [‘football schools’, yes?] have loud, boisterous students that do organized chants, wear wigs, pack the arena. Our students seem about half that enthusiastic. Why?

Well, on the positive, I expected to read most of the comments, but since there are so many already, I barely got through a handful. There are a lot more Texas fans on the internet than at the Erwin Center. I have my criticisms of Barnes, but I agree with everything in this post… particularly liked JC’s comment near the top.

I usually love what you guys write here, but I have to rip this to shreds. Sweet and Simple.

1.) Our fan base has bitched and moaned about not wanting one and dones. Well you got em and all they are doing is playing their asses off and getting better every game.

2.) Our fan base didn’t has never shown up. As RS said, we our the most apathetic, arrogant, and white collared fan base in America. Schools with more diverse and less diverse student bodies are louder and more organized. Smaller schools and larger schools are more spirited. There’s nothing special about UT that excludes students from showing up to basketball games in force. Are we a commuter school now? Did anyone watch Duke-Maryland last night? Holy shit what a huge student section.

In other words, nothing new. Next year there are a couple of possible 6’11" one and dones coming. No one will show up for them either no matter who the coach is.

This former die-hard bball fan who is now only casually interested has 2 complaints:

1) LHN
We are letting ESPN sacrifice half our season to make more money. If I can’t access the games I’m less inclined to have interest in the team.
2). I don’t know the team
This has already been addressed but I don’t get excited about rooting for an entirely different team every year. Especially if much of the pre-conference slate where I can get to know them is unavailable to me.
My favorite teams were the ones with guys I had been watching develop and grow together for multiple seasons.

Read about half of the posts before making my own, but it seems that most of my angst has been covered here.

I live in Florida, so I’m not going to show up to a basketball game anyway. But my apathy has obviously peaked when my wife has to point out that Texas is playing and I’m not watching, and the opponent was A&M.

I have no connection to these players because I could not watch them scrimmage the early teams. I have no desire to connect to them, because I feel that the ones that are any good won’t be wearing burnt orange next year anyway.

It seems like we are perpetually looking to next year for the breakthrough, then half of the team goes to the NBA and even that optimism is shot down.

You sum up all of the points really well Scipio. I really couldn’t care less about Texas basketball right now.

Competition has a lot to do with it as well. The Big East enjoys this.

Anyone excited about watching TTU or Baylor all these years?

Scip,

I’ll try to make this short. Texas fans need Texas to be great. We’re a bit fair-weather in our approach. Although we love our football, we don’t come early, we don’t stay late, and we’re not loud (we do wear orange unless there is a more fashionable alternative). When Texas teams are great, it makes Texas fans feel great and our numbers increase. When Texas teams are not great, our numbers thin. Football suffers less of this but it does have the same characteristics. It’s why 13-12 is so hard for us to take. Football greatness defines us. The expectation of a return to greatness keeps the attrition minimal.

Basketball is fun for Texas fans but it takes a back seat to fall football, spring football, and recruiting football. If you are not going to give us great basketball, our interest is going to fade. I don’t think this season’s attendance is about failures of seasons past, but rather about the knowledge that this team will not provide greatness to the Texas brand and, transitively, to the Texas fan base. Fan interest will return to basketball when the chance for, or expectation of, greatness returns.

Randall, that’s kinda our identity. If it’s important to you that your school’s fan base not be white collar and only casually interested in our bball team maybe you should root for another school.
Personally I love basketball but I’m not sure it’s an indictment against someone’s character if they are disinterested in it.

I’m enjoying the development of the team currently, even though only as a distant observer. If I had access to the games via the internet I’d probably be more invested.

I guess it’s hard for me to understand how, at a school with 50000 students on campus, and another million or so alumni within 30 minutes of the arena, how there is not a hardcore group of basketball fans that number at least 10000. On the other hand, Ok St has been giving tickets away to their home games most of the year and still can’t fill the arena so it’s not just us.

I totally agree with everything written here. I decided from the beginning of the season I wasn’t going to get my hopes up and fall for another RB failure. I have watched maybe 1 and a half games this season and can name 4 players on the team, after previously being a die hard fan since I was a freshman in 2004.

Also, the Erwin Center is not a great place for a basketball game, especially when most of the student seats are in the upper deck

RS,
Stillwater, OK has about 46k living that town while UT has 50k students and about a million people living within 30 to 40 minutes of the Drum.

I’ve been saying this for a while, but UT does not do a good job marketing their basketball team to the general population. For the students, I think if you play a game or two at Gregory during the first few games of the season against “scrimmage” teams, you might get some early season buzz that carries over to bigger games at the Drum.

Yes, this season has been lame, but we’ve had some amazing players (and teams) here over the last decade and UT has not maximized the gate during this period. Not even close.

I find it telling that there are already more comments on this article than just about any other update regarding the basketball team all season.

From the article: Old muppet guys in the balcony = Stadler & Waldorf. I don’t know why I know that. I’m not proud that I know that.

This has been beaten to death, and I think almost all of the points of have addressed pretty reasonably.

As for the perspective of Texas fan who doesn’t live in Austin (me), this article and the comments made me realize that I almost never think to go to a Longhorn hoops game when I’m visiting my little sister in Austin, and this is a departure from my usual course of business in Austin.

(For example, walking by the Tennis center, I’ve noticed Texas playing, and although I don’t remember if they charged for tickets or not, I’ve always walked in, watched and rooted for the Horns.) There have only been a few exceptions to my going to Longhorn games when I’ve been in town (I did miss an Arkansas State matchup one year when I was in town and in fact walking around campus, because the price seemed really high for a meaningless matchup.)

I’m not exactly sure why that as, but as some have pointed out here, the Drum is not on campus. It just never occurs to me to go watch a Longhorns hoops matchup.

As for watching on TV, I think my reduced watching is more of a result of working a 9-5 and being tired early in the evening. That said, if Texas is on, I usually fall asleep with the television on the game.

1 and done + mediocre team = bad attendance. Remove either of those and people will come. Either they’ll be more connected to the team or rooting for something with promise.

Jeff raises another interesting point. When you watch games on tv, you see that the seats occupied on the sidelines are all crazy, yelling students. When you look at those same seats at the Drum, there isn’t a person there who is under 65 years old. Most of them are asleep. So, I’m assuming that these are big dollar donors who are given choice seats but how do other schools handle that issue?

There was a sequence against ISU when Texas went on a run and there was quite a bit of fan noise. ISU called a timeout and the stands behind press row were seen on tv. There must have been 3 dozen people in the camera shot, all old fogies, who were not only NOT standing, they weren’t even clapping. Really?

John Galt – You nailed it perfectly – nothing more to see here!

“Every timeout is a sedative commercial break. The professional-level video intros are so out-of-place, it’s jarring.”

Yes, yes, yes. Home basketball games are apparently “produced” by the same folks who bring you the abomination that has become home football games. I don’t know if it’s IMG Sports, but it is certainly a prepackaged formula (we have a weather forecast at the beginning of an indoor event?) that is being sold by someone to schools all over the country (exact same bad canned music in so many arenas cannot be coincidence). 90 percent of stoppages in play are jampacked with ridiculous marketing and advertising – they even squeeze two different promotions into one of them now. If something that happens on the court does inspire a few other folks to join some lonesome fan who had the temerity to stand up and question an official, or boo, or tell Scott Drew he’s a bad person, the wind is sucked right out of their sails as soon as our former gentleman’s club employee of a p.a. announcer begins desperately trying to interest the crowd in a free pizza. I am a broken record about this subject, but it bugs the hell out of me and I think it is a serious impediment to ever developing a real home field advantage in any sport. No genuine, spontaneous emotion can ever be sustained in that environment, and so the fan experience is diminished – buried under an avalanche of advertising and lame piped-in music from 10 to 20 years ago. And let me preempt the argument that the canned music is what the kids (players) want to hear. I doubt many of them have Blizzard of Ozz, or Appetite for Destruction, or The Razor’s Edge on their IPods. To reduce this screed to one sentence: The minor league baseball model is not appropriate or necessary to lure people to the event or improve their experience once there if the event is Texas football or basketball.

And here’s something else that hinders attendance. $40 for arena level seats. I know with slight effort one can procure a decent ticket from a scalper for less than that, but as a not infrequent reseller over the last 25 years, I can tell you that some folks simply will not engage with a scalper, they’d rather pay face for a lousy seat from the box office. People get scared off by that $40 price tag for everything but maybe Kansas or the rare high profile non-conference game.

Finally, there’s this. Familiarity breeds contempt. Everyone knows Barnes does not call timeouts to blunt momentum (c.f. Bill Self), runs Tom Penders’ 1-on-5 play at the end of every half and game, suffers scoreless droughts of up to 8 minutes with regularity, never attempts the tactical early tech, rarely presses, subs in a rarely-used reserve guard near the end of the first half, and has an extremely quick hook for most any transgression on the court. He’s won a ton of games with that formula, without question. But we’ve all seen the movie too many times. It’s stale.

I’m curious as to why so many great recruits are going to Baylor and Oklahoma St.

Also, is there anything wrong with our basketball S&C? It seems none of our post players, even after 4 years, become anymore physically imposing than when they arrive at the program.

Fundamental marketing of a brand (ie Texas basketball) means you have to get your face out there in front of people. The corner store, the TV commercial, etc.. all put your face in front of potential customers. The basketball version of a commercial is the game itself. We haven’t been able to watch many. Our corner store (the Drum) is off the beaten path and is not user friendly by any means. Is it no wonder the product (basketball) struggles when it is already a marginal brand after football. Less than die hard fans can easily forget about a game when there is so little marketing to remind them when the game is and the venue does not support the event.

I’ve been over Barnes for a while.

Barnes and Dodds need to look at the Mack Brown model – slaying the HS coaches and parents.

Scip: I basically stopped reading Simmons when he savaged Barnes over Durant. It was unfair and unrelenting.

nobis: Kabongo may well leave. It’s been the MO of the Findlay guys. Hope not, as he would benefit from another year at this level. Brown may well be able to go. But walking away at that point would be to ignore the recruiting that has happened since. These last two classes are full of guys who are more likely to be four-year players than not. I don’t think that signals a change in recruiting philosophy. He had to restock the entire roster, not just the top level.

A random comment: Frankly, I would rather have Lewis and McClellan getting the minutes they have than to have Cory Joseph on the team.

Another random comment: While Barnes desperately wants to win a NC, he’s still much more comfortable coaching a team like this one, that has a lot to learn.

UT ChemE: No, nothing wrong with basketball S&C.

jc: Regarding your excellent post:

2) Much has been made of the KU “seven in a row.” That includes two ties with Texas. But for some reason, people who are unaware assume Texas hasn’t been at that level. Shoulda won it outright last year, but we’ve been over that.

4) On KU bench development: It wouldn’t take that long, if you had the access, to find message boarders complaining about the Christian Moodys, Tyrel Reeds, Brady Morningstars and Conner Teahens that have been starting over the years. I directly attribute some of the failure of the last couple of years at Texas over the lack of development. That doesn’t mean that KU fans wouldn’t rather have studs in those spots, because they would.

Vasherized: Your perception is the elephant in the room. When it comes down to it, Texas fans consider basketball to be a winter diversion, pure entertainment. To KU fans, it’s life.

I’d also point out that tickets-sold attendance, which is what Texas reports to the NCAA, peaked in 2010. It went down last year.

BIH said, “Vasherized: Your perception is the elephant in the room. When it comes down to it, Texas fans consider basketball to be a winter diversion, pure entertainment. To KU fans, it’s life.”

I know that this has a strong element of truth to it, but I still think UT has done a horrible job of marketing their basketball program. This year would not be a good barometer, but looking back we have had NBA caliber players, lots of them, on the floor. That’s some decent product to sell and I’m not seeing the pitch.

Basketball will never be quite the draw that football is at Texas, but it could be a lot better.

Imagine the scene at Gregory if UT played a game there that was 70 to 80% of students in the stands. Specifically, pitch the game as a on-campus love fest where the players interact with the students pre/post game. I believe it seats 4,400. Give about 4,000 seats to students and let them go nuts. Our first game this season was against Boston U and we had 9800 according to UT website. Was that accurate? Next game was Rhode Island and we had 4,000.

For nightclubs, restaurants etc, perception is reality and if you can show a raucous scene at Gregory to start the season, you might actually get some buts in the seats for the rest of the season if the 1 million people that live around Austin think it’s the “it” place to be.

Having no TV coverage, or shots of Stadler & Waldorf comfortably reclined in the 3rd row (even when the game is exciting) don’t inspire a lot casual fans to give a rats ass about UT basketball.

I’m really glad this thread was started. Scip is absolutely right that Barnes is the greatest coach Texas has ever had, and it’s sort of remarkable that this obvious fact still must be stated. Barnes is in my opinion the most underappreciated basketball coach in Division 1 if you consider the quality of institutional support relative to quality of results.

There are two structural problems he faces, and they’re mutually reinforcing: (1) The fans are awful. Texas fans are collectively lazy, inattentive, quiet, and ill informed in most sports (football included) relative to peer institution fans, and this is especially true in hoops. (2) The venue the team plays in was seemingly custom designed to produce the worst possible basketball experience. It’s too large, the seating is too far from the court, the acoustics are bad. It’s painful to hear the silence on tv—flip back and forth between some throwaway ACC or Big 10 or Big East game some time, hell, even an Iowa State home game—and of course even worse in person. Take bad fans, put them in a bad, multi-purpose arena, and it makes for terrible entertainment, regardless of the quality of the product on the floor. And without more fan interest and associated donor largesse, you won’t build the intimate, basketball-specific, 8,500 venue that the men (and women) deserve.

Above all, can we please ask the Longhorn Band to drop the electric bass? The whole aesthetic is wrong, wrong, wrong. What’d they do with the tubas?

@Texoz: I am a current student (and go to every game) and have been calling for the school to set up atleast one game in Gregory since I enrolled. I have gone to a few volleyball games there and the crowd is so much more into the game than the crowd at the FEC. I think you are right on about the luring effect it might have on part of the student body. At the same time though, I think for it to have a carryover effect to the FEC, the school needs to open a few more sections of lower level seats to the students. Our student section allocation has to be one of the worst in college basketball.

Someone above also mentioned the fact that we squeeze every advertisement we can into commercial breaks, which ruins any crowd noise we had going into the break. I completely agree, but it can be argued that it is a double edged sword. As Texas fans, we all love the fact that our athletic dept makes the most revenue in the country, but where do we think it all comes from. I realize that the revenue from bball isn’t significant to the revenue from football, but I am commenting more on the athletic dept’s thought process. They see the advertising during timeouts as the way to maximize revenue but it comes at the expense of crowd atmosphere. Personally, I would love to give up part of our revenue stream in order to have a more raucous crowd for basketball and football. At the end of the day, some of it should be about the students and I think the school needs to spend a little less time trying to figure out how to make the most money, and more time trying to cater a bit more to students/players/home court advantage etc. This, of course is all dependent on the student body responding and showing up.

RApple14
I went to women’s volleyball game (Dec 2010 vs UCLA) and even though it was only 3/4 full, the atmosphere was great, as was the match.

Also agree they need to squeeze some student seats around the sides, especially behind visitors’ bench, but the students are going to have to show up in better numbers to justify that.

Juice i could not agree more. I’ve hated the environment in there for a long time but have never been able to express it that well. Well done

Does anyone know if Belmont is even paying attention, or seriously listening to the concerns of the more rabid fans?

I have been a season ticket holder since the year the Erwin Center opened 1978…until this year. I just couldn’t justify it ($600) per ticket with a horrible non-con, a down Big 12, an average team, a bad offense, etc.. WTF? Seriously, $600 per???? They were under $200 each just ten years ago, $300 five years ago. What the hell happened? Does Belmont not realize this economy has sucked for 4 years now? Are all Texas fans made of money and I am the only one that has to allocate my entertainment budget? Am I the only fan that has kids and the $200 it would cost me to take my family to the game is better spent on a weeklong day camp or a weeklong campout than spending two hours in the PCL err EC?

I have traveled to probably 15 NCAA tourneys over the last 25 years to see my Horns play. I was once as big a fan as there was. I have been to zero games this year and haven’t watched more than a half of any game on t.v. You know what? I don’t miss it. Little league, Middle School and High School ball are far more entertaining that what we roll out there on a regular basis. And it costs like $3. Belmont can blow me for all I care.

Texoz, FWIW, I’ve heard that Gregory is no longer suitable for hoops — something about not enough floor space.

Jester is right next door… I’ll date myself and note that I used to leave games there and be back in my room in about five minutes. A true on-campus arena (which the Drum may now be, considering expansion of campus over the last 30 years) — at least something that is within easy walking distance for students in dorms — would help. My feeling is that there is only so much you can do to cater to people. They have to want to go.

Practically speaking, if you really wanted to get some buzz with an event like this, you’d have to make the opponent worthy of interest. Playing Nicholls State at GG doesn’t really get the job done. So do you play Temple there? That was the best n-c game they had.

RApple: Giving students better seats is a tough call. If they don’t use them, you’ve booted people from the lower bowl who are among your larger donors. They would have to fill what they have (actually go into the mezz) on a regular basis before I would call for that. If you’re gonna have empty seats, you may as well have them be fully paid seats.

I hate to say it, but there just aren’t very many committed Texas basketball fans. There are lots of fair-weather fans, and lots of casual fans. Even many of the “dedicated” basketball fans are football fans first and foremost and have — frankly — a poor understanding of the game/sport, in many cases because they view it through the lens of football.

At least at my water cooler, the same people as always are interested in the team, and at about the same level as they always have been. I’d argue that the simple fact that this team’s ceiling is clearly much lower than most recent teams, combined with the fact that so many of the games haven’t been on TV, explains 95% of whatever disinterest there is.

In other words, I’m not sure anything has really changed. The hardcore hoops fans are still as interested in this team as any other, and the sea of casual/fair-weather fans will be back when the team is in the rankings and easy to see. Texas fans can barely stand to watch a young football team in a developmental year. What reason is there to believe they’re going to be interested in watching a young basketball team without a Durant-level star to make the process less bumpy?

As someone who’s attended pretty much every home basketball game between 1983 and 2012 except for the three years I didn’t live in Austin, this is par for the course. We do slightly better with fans when the team is exceptionally good, but even then don’t do nearly as well as we should. And we do terribly with fans when we’re anything less than that.

Part of it’s the fans, and part of it the athletics department, which promotes the men’s basketball team as much and as well as it promotes the women’s tennis team. Which is to say, not at all.

Also agree they need to squeeze some student seats around the sides, especially behind visitors’ bench, but the students are going to have to show up in better numbers to justify that.

Not allowed by B12 rules.

A couple of things about Barnes. I fit the mold of one who used to love the guy but has now become luke warm. The apathy on part stems from his inability to teach a cohesive brand of offense that doesn’t rely on a transcendent point guard to be effective. Barnes’ teams seem to get worse on the offensive side as the season progresses. Several years ago I remember watching us beat UCLA at home with an up tempo style of basketball in which players shared the ball yet got it to the hole. The same was true about the offense in the game in Dallas against UNC, yet where did that style go from that point to the end of the season.

It seems Barnes coaches the confidence and talent out of his teams. Once the confidence goes the teams fade. the historically pathetic FT % for barnes’ teams is indicative of their lack of confidence. The Arizona game last year was only close because J’covan went off. there was no offense being run, just one guy on fire. the last play of the game was indicative of lack of coaching imagination. j’covan drove 1 on 3 and through up a wild attempt that had no chance of going in, while he had a wide open gary johnson 5 ft from the hoop waiting for an open look.

also, to a certain degree the longhorn network is to blame. the team is new and out of sight out of mind for most fans.

Barton: I’ve not had season tickets but I’ve seen tickets out of a package, and I thought the ticket prices were much too high five years ago. (Same with football, FWIW.) The corporate mindset drove this, assumed that orange blood was thicker than it is. I sure couldn’t justify that kind of money. Don’t blame you a bit.

Right on Major Major. Well said.

Like many others who grew up in Texas, I never really bonded to the sport of basketball. Oftern, when the football season ends, I have tried to be interested in Longhorn basketball, but I lose interest even before the incessant timeouts. And worse, the game is too often decided by a baffling call (or nocall) by the officials.

It’s ridiculous to blame this on the fans. Barnes strongly appears to have topped out. He has no coherent strategy for today’s “one and done” environment and he has given new meaning to “offensive” basketball with his random ball screen offense. His players literally were confused about their offensive roles two minutes into the Iowa State game the other night. It is simply painful to watch this team play set offense right now and people are voting with their feet.

Bob, agree on football too. I went to multiple football games this year and paid under $15 to sit lower level between the 20s. People aren’t going. They can’t afford $80-90 face and so they don’t show up. There are much more sellers than buyers and it’s only going to get worse. If we don’t win big in football this year, you will see 10k+ empty seats. It’s coming. Belmont has priced out the middle class and with this economy they are in danger of pricing out the upper middle class. For the life of me I can’t think of why they don’t show the fans that go to the games some compassion and reduce ticket prices when they already take in far more than they can spend on everything else. When your stadium has empty seats, it is bad for your brand. Belmont doesn’t understand this, but come next year they will, imo.

Here’s the strange thing about Texas basketball – people always talk about Barnes as a guy who demands excellence on defense but will deal with mediocrity on offense to get it. The truth just doesn’t bear that out. In reality, Texas has been elite-very good on offense since 2003, and very good-good on defense. Texas’s pace of play in some years has confused this truth.

2003 – 79th in tempo, 3rd in Offense, 44th in Defense
2004 – 201st (T), 15th(O), 22nd (D)
2005 – 143rd (T), 25th (O), 44th (D)
2006 – 246th (T), 4th (O), 10th (D)
2007 – 97th (T), 5th (O), 62nd (D)
2008 – 251st (T), 3rd (O), 36th (D)
2009 – 182nd (T), 39th (O), 28th (D)
2010 – 12th (T), 25th (O), 25th (D)
2011 – 155th (T), 21st (O), 2nd (D)
2012 – 222nd (T), 22nd (O), 22nd (D)

Average: 158.8 (T), 16.2 (O), 29.4 (D)

(all numbers courtesy KenPom)

In reality, I would suggest that Barnes has done a pretty decent job of deciding which groups need to play quick or slow, and done a pretty good job with offense.

@PB: Back when Jeff Moore’s teams were winning National Championships, the athletics department actually DID market the women’s tennis team.

Sorry, but if you think Rick barnes is a better coach than Abe Lemons was, then you just aren’t old enough…or, at least, you’re going to have to prove it….

@Thermhere I’m glad someone else noticed those numbers, and will await the inevitable crescendo of voices saying how misleading (or just plain wrong) they are.

Excellent points, Bob and Bartoncreek. Belmont is to blame for a lot of this. It’s all about the big donors, and a painful number of lower-level hoops tickets are held by big donors who get them because they donated big for football purposes.

And lawdog13, thank you for proving my point.

Lawdog, I said the fans are terrible. I’m not sure what you think is being blamed on them. It is just pretty objectively true. Do you think Texas fans would, as a group, say they’re good fans relative to other schools? I don’t. Even when the team is rolling and in the top 5, we don’t sellout against quality opponents, don’t make much noise, make noise at the wrong times, boo at good calls and don’t boo at bad calls, etc.

As to our offense and fans “voting with their feet”: We could run a Petey Carrill era Princeton offense to Patek Philippe perfection, and our fans would be equally disinterested as they are now. This very season, on the handful of occasions I’ve been able to watch on tv (I live in New York), we’ve actually had some quite lovely backdoor cuts—and even made the bucket, which is a change from years past—and the home crowd reaction was a collective yawn and polite applause.

I have no idea how Barnes consistently gets top recruits to come to Austin to play in front of small, quiet crowds, but he does. It remains a marvel to me that people don’t recognize how much the guy has brought to a school that (as always, with exceptions) doesn’t really care much about basketball.

When your stadium has empty seats, it is bad for your brand. Belmont doesn’t understand this, but come next year they will, imo.

I was going to say in my response to Texoz and RApple that Bellmont is in the business of maximizing revenue, not maximizing attendance. Sometimes those things move in tandem, and sometimes not. I agree, at some point, the lines will cross going the other way, but I can’t guess exactly when.

My wife and I went to one football game last year, paid face for better seats than we have been used to using. That was enough for us.

In other words, I’m not sure anything has really changed.

PB, I agree 100 percent. It is pretty much the way it has always been.

The opening of the Drum enabled bandwagoners to jump on when it was convenient. Then DeLoss changed the rules to keep give big donors dibs on the best seats regardless of whether they cared to use them. Barnes asked for a separate, dedicated stream of LHF donations for basketball and Dodds turned him down. (This was actually printed in the Statesman about five years ago… I was astounded.) I assume that is the end of it.

So you have an artificial “support” for basketball that limits attendance in the seats that you most want to fill. Combine that with a casual fan base that has expectations of excellence, and the slightest dip in results causes a huge dropoff in attendance. Thank you, Econ 304K.

By and large, I find that many of the “reasons” for not attending are more like excuses. It gets back to the idea that the ticket buyers want to be entertained more than they want to see the team win. I can guarantee you that it is the opposite for the KU fans.

“As Texas fans, we all love the fact that our athletic dept makes the most revenue in the country, but where do we think it all comes from. I realize that the revenue from bball isn’t significant to the revenue from football, but I am commenting more on the athletic dept’s thought process. They see the advertising during timeouts as the way to maximize revenue but it comes at the expense of crowd atmosphere.”

There’s a lot of talk on this site about the business side of sports and what a great job we do at it. The facts are evident, we do. My question is always: to what end? I think we chase our tail on this stuff, especially all these crappy advertisements and promotions. Cut a few of them, then cut a few of the people we hired to be responsible for soliciting, implementing and monitoring them, and maybe we have a net financial gain and a better experience. People bitch about government waste all the time, but one entity that will never see more money that it can spend is a big university athletic department. Talk about top heavy with administrators . . .

The revenue argument always brings me back to the stretch of several years when the football team opened on the road against a good opponent. I think this coincided with Chris Plonsky’s arrival. The argument in favor was that we did this to get on TV, which brought money and exposure. Unfortunately, the exposure it brought was often terrible, because if I recall correctly we got absolutely smoked in most if not all of those games. The revenue was offset by the fact that we didn’t go bowling in any of those seasons. And, the long-term development of the program was inhibited because we missed out on the famously important bowl practices, and the exposure and, more importantly perhaps, momentum, from being in the post-season. Staying home for the holidays every year doesn’t leave you much to sell recruits about the direction of the program. That was far too long that we spent in the wasteland before Mack brought his salemanship to the Forty Acres, and scheduling in pursuit of TV money was part of it.

As for Gregory, it’s a great idea, and we ought to do it with a game or two for which the students are in town. I ran this up the flagpole about 10 years ago and got something like Bob (I think) said about the court being improperly configured or something. I call b.s. Spend some of that LHN money on fixing that.

Wasn’t it Abe Lemons that told one of players, after finding out he made 4 – F’s and 1-D1.
“Son, I see the problem – you’ve been spending too much time on one subject”?

Snide: That was a famous Shelby Metcalf line. I really liked Shelby.

Thermhere:

I have been trying to make the argument that Barnes’ teams do better historically than O than on D for some time, but it falls on deaf ears. I have given up, but I encourage you to fight the good fight.

I think it is more than just pace that is a factor here. You also have to look into what makes Barnes’ offenses good. They don’t turn the ball over, and they crash the offensive glass. No one notices when you don’t turn the ball over, but it is the most important thing an offense can do. And people seem to fixate on the missed shots, and not really notice that the offensive rebounds can make up for a lot of them.

That is the cliff note version of this:

http://www.burntorangenation.com/2011/5/28/2194792/a-examination-of-the-performance-of-rick-barnes-offenses

Agree, Reggie. They don’t look like much, but they get the job done.

KenPom’s Game Plan tells the story. When they lose, it’s usually because the other team went to town on offense in some form. Lately, it’s because they’ve been lighting it up BTA. Iowa State went 5-for-21 BTA and lo and behold, had its worst offensive efficiency of the season.

Bob, I never said they quit. I said it looked like they did not care. If that happens at the first of a game, and then they hustle like crazy at the end, it is still a loss.

One comment on the one and dones and early entrants. Most or many, like Durant, have had great attitudes, were a joy to watch, and, although you knew wed miss them badly, we didnt begrudge them their dream. The more recent early entrants, excluding Thompson, had bad attitudes, underachieved, or both. I was actively vaguely pissed at Barnes for bringing those guys on campus. Left a real sour taste.

Bob, I never said they quit. I said it looked like they did not care.

Not having what you are supposed to do be second-nature often looks like a lack of caring. These guys are still adjusting to college ball and its added intricacies. Getting into the flow of the game helps, but their muscle memory is still being built.

I hate to say it, but there just aren’t very many committed Texas basketball fans. There are lots of fair-weather fans, and lots of casual fans. Even many of the "dedicated" basketball fans are football fans first and foremost and have — frankly — a poor understanding of the game/sport, in many cases because they view it through the lens of football.

Jack Gray, Harold Bradley, Leon Black and Abe Lemons approve of this message.

Why did Durant have to create his own shot?

What is really amazing, is that Durant as an NBA player gets his shots within the flow of the offense more than any other superstar. It is really amazing to watch.

And, I actually think he did his best coaching job that year outside of his first year. I saw every Durant home game, and sat behind the bench for 5 or 6 of them. It was amazing how positive he was and how little he focused on jumping their ass for defensive breakdowns (by far the worst Barnes team on defense). He let those kids play, as you should with 5 freshman and a couple of sophs in the rotation.

I know that, personally, the LHN is killing my Horns basketball fan soul. I did not think this would bother me as much as it did.

While we have never had good midweek crowds, the basketball ignorant Horns fan is not going to show up for Iowa State no matter how important it is.

Finally, we will not have good basketball fans until we get out of The Drum, and give the students half of the gym. We need a compact basketball specific arena on campus if we want to elevate student support.

I say we knock down the Art History Building and put it there.

We also need a class to teach us when to be loud. We can replace the stupid Art college with Basketball fan 301 and other quality electives.

Barnes just doesn’t coach offense.

Also, skymonkeyhorn, I love your round ball takes. Please post more often.

Great debate. Might be the first time all season I’ve been intrigued by a basketball post, thereby proving Scip’s premise. And it’s for many of the reasons that have already been discussed.

But here’s one reason that I’m not sure anyone has discussed (unless I missed it in my skimming): The precipitous fall of Texas men’s athletics Big Three Sports since January 2010.

I can recall tailgating with friends at the Rose Bowl before the Alabama game and planning out our Holy Trifecta of Longhorn Domination: the BCS championship game in Pasadena (check), a Final Four in Indianapolis, and a College World Series trip to Omaha for a Rosenblatt grand finale. It was going to be an epic accomplishment for one program—a feat never to be duplicated again—and we were going to see them all in person!

And then Colt got hurt.
And then our #1 basketball team cratered.
And then Augie’s top-5 team lost to TCU and missed a trip to Omaha that summer.
And then the 2010 football season happened.
And so on …

Frankly, it completely demoralized me and my groups of friends (and, I suspect, many others). After enduring numerous disappointments during the 80s and 90s, this program-wide collapse was devastating to us. WE. WERE. THIS. CLOSE. And I think it came down to that old axiom about “under-promising and over-delivering.” Instead, we’ve seen the opposite since January 2010 in all three sports, to the point where we are being pwned by Baylor in football and basketball.

For someone like me who is a “Texas fan” more than a “Texas basketball fan”, it’s not a “Barnes” problem. It’s a systemic problem. And it’s going to take some time for gun-shy fans like me to recover from it.

1> the crowds are an embarrassment. where are the students? when i was there 75-79
      most every game was sold out.
2> Erwin Center is awful. admit it. one of the worst basketball venues for a major college
     (except for Vanderbilt). no home court advantage. time for Dodds to announce a new
     one post haste.
3> Barnes is not the problem. but he must shift to recruiting players that will STAY 3 years.
4> Games that are on tv seem like watching softball games at the library.
5> donor tickets are a major problem and they don’t have the balls to fix it.
6> Dodds should let Gail G. know her last day is June 30th. 5 years. no top 25 program.
      pathetic recruiting. Dodds promised best coaches at every sport. time to bite the bullet.
      i won’t speak of the elephant in the room. you know what it is, sad to say.

Dodds should let Gail G. know her last day is June 30th. 5 years.

It’s not Dodds’ call.

Admit it, it’s not just a UT problem. Outside of schools that are strictly basketball, (Duke, Georgetown, and every eastern school ESPN loves… sorry I forgot you Gonzaga) college basketball in January is about as important, game to game, as a June series between the Astros and the Rangers. Win enough in your conference, finish 9-7 or so, 18-20 wins overall and your in the tourney. Texas basketball fans will only live and die with playing the high ranked teams, or games that could end the season.

Sorry, I would like to correct my own English….. You are in the tournament. Wow, I feel better.

I was at the Iowa State game, which was the first game I’d seen in person since Temple. I may be wrong, but it looked to me like Kabango has some back problems. He couldn’t stay in front of their white point guard (who I refer to like that because I’m too lazy to check the spelling of his name). He should have eaten that guy’s lunch, but he couldn’t break down in the correct defensive stance and then move laterally. I mention this because if I’m right it could affect his one and done status.

Believe it or not, J’Covan’s mom would like to see him graduate. Doesn’t mean he necessarily will though. One of my all time favorite Texas players. Has more than a splash of Earl the Pearl in him.

This has been a wonderful thread. Great thoughts.

Phil, I assume you are referring to the original Pearl (Monroe) and not the fat copy who played at The ’Cuse (Washington)?

I think almost all of the reasons listed above are valid and have had a cumulative effect… and then there’s this: seeing a school like Butler make two consecutive NCAA Finals. They are everything we are not, and its depressing. It has definitely pushed me over the edge. I won’t attend a single game this year, and it has been virtually impossible to even give the tickets away(other than KU).

“Also, is there anything wrong with our basketball S&C? It seems none of our post players, even after 4 years, become anymore physically imposing than when they arrive at the program.”

UTChemE – I’d venture to say that this is actually the biggest strenght of this program. People question Barnes daily but no one ever questions Todd Wright and rightfully so. First, how many post players have we had stay 4 years……the answer is not many and the ones that did stay, didn’t necessarily have games that would have translated to them bulking up (i.e. Boddicker, Atchley, etc)…….Wright worked wonders with Dex (this one is obvious) and Klotz, but never had a chance with guys like LaMarcus, etc. He’s obviously not a post, but look at JCB now versus what he was as a Freshman.Dude was a pudgy little punk and now he’s all rocked up. Hell, speaking of posts, even Chap has gotten leaner and more muscular this year while Chap is clearly stronger and more flexible.

stevelonghorns1:

Never been to a Vanderbilt game. Why is the area bad? I am genuinely curious, as I have a soft spot for raised courts (did my grad school days at Minnesota, and I love the Barn).

To echo marqroid, Todd Wright is Barnes’ not-so-secret weapon at this point. Could be the best basketball strength and conditioning program in the country. By the time these guys are in their second or third year, no one is pushing them around. I can’t wait to see how much of a beast Jaylen Bond is going to become.

Adding to the list of players that Todd Wright has really helped: Lexi, James Thomas, Royal Ivey, Hamilton… the list just goes on and on.

Jake, Earl Monroe for sure. The unstated point of my post above is that if lightening strikes and Kabongo and Brown come back then we’re talking about a totally different kettle of fish next year and we’re not having this discussion. If they get the LHN mess straightened out by next season it would help tremendously, as I couldn’t agree more that it’s had an affect on fan support. I still think seeing both Brown and Kabongo here next year is unlikely, but now it’s at least a possibility. If Keith White doesn’t get the compensation package he’s looking for and Ridley ends up in Austin on top of all the above then you’re in the UT hoops salad days again. Unlikely but possible.

For me, it is out of sight and out of mind. I, like 99.99% of Americans do not have the LHN and cannot watch many of the games.

cincinnatus: I don’t get it. You’re out because the teams let you down?

Great discussion here. Fans are fans. When UT is in the hunt, the Erwin center is full. The latest Barnes product is not very good, so the crowds won’t come. I agree with all the comments about Barnes deficiencies as well as his accomplishment. But the bottom line is, until Texas wins a NC or at least gets to another final 4, the apathy will continue. Can Barnes get them there? Given what I’ve seen as well as most on this board, I think the answer is no. Rick is a really good coach. Elite, no way. As long as DD is OK with that, then we’ll bump along as a respectable program and nothing more.

Newy: Not just directed at you, but now that the games are on, you’re not going to watch? I’ve not understood this either.

But the bottom line is, until Texas wins a NC or at least gets to another final 4, the apathy will continue.

Andy, if that’s the case, they might as well shut down the program. “FF or nothing” is a ridiculous expectation.

The last few games have been on but I simply have not been vested in the team at all. The Kansas game was the first game I saw this year (living in Colorado). One cannot simply flip a switch so easily and say “OK, now I’m all in!”

Heck, I barely knew who the starters were. In 2009 I flew to Arkansas for a road game and Austin for a few big home games. This year? Knowing I would not really get to see the team for the first 10-15 games really soured me. I don’t know why but it did.

And if fans cannot see the Spring game or get any real coverage on Texas football because of LHN I bet you will see something like this happen in football as well albeit much more muted.

You cannot anti-market something and expect interest to stay the same.

I’m not saying the rollout of the LHN hasn’t been mismanaged. Obviously, it has. That’s on the provider that promised the moon.

But what you’ve said is, three years ago you traveled multiple times to see the team, but this year, because of the LHN, you don’t care. That seems so superficial, since KU was the eighth game this year that has been widely available either on weekends or at night. Every game but one the rest of the season will be.

I understand that Texas basketball is an afterthought to a lot of football fans. But that’s not you, if you travel like that. For me, and the people I know, they like the team, or the game, or both. I would have to like both to travel. And I sure wouldn’t give it up over not being able to watch the worst games on the schedule. (And, since you live in Colorado, you haven’t been able to see those games, anyway.)

To do what Bartoncreek did would be hard on me, but I can see doing it over a fundamental issue — requiring too much time/money, or a disagreement over what was going on in the program. (I had another friend who walked away during the Weltlich years and didn’t go back until he was gone.)

Like I said it is hard to explain. I feel like the athletic department has gone out of it’s way to make it harder for me to follow basketball. Why should I expend the same resources? You can point the finger at ESPN but ultimately if my school takes something away from me I am not as excited about it.

Our athletic department needs to realize high levels of fan interest and financial support are not birth rights. The fan still needs a good experience to want to spend.

Phil, I think there is something wrong with Kabongo’s back. When he went to the scorer’s table to go back into the game against Kansas he yanked some improbably large pad out of the back of his shorts!

I am a huge UT B-ball fan. Not being able to watch them on TV is the primary reason I have not interest this year. I can’t even give you the starting line up off the top of my head. I can for the last 4 seasons though.

Longhorn Network is 100% to blame.

I made this post last year after the Arizona loss, but it feels appropriate to the thread.

Here’s how I break down Barnes’ ability as a coach:

Offense: C(Would have been C-/D+ prior to this year)
Barnes deserves credit for revamping his offense this off-season & coming back with a whole new approach. It worked for the most part, though some of his personnel didn’t fit exactly with the new scheme & as the season wore on teams learned how to defend it(and his adjustments to the new defense had mixed results). I’m very interested to see what he comes back with next season considering the offensive firepower he’s going to have on hand. Honestly, I don’t think Barnes has ever fully fleshed this part of his coaching out because he’s never had this kind of talent at his disposal on a regular basis. Historically he’s used to having 4-year guys, scrappers who were shorter on talent and long on effort. With those guys you can play tough, bang bodies, crash the boards, and play solid D. That’s what his reputation was before he came here, and that’s what Texas teams have been for the most part.
Defense: A-
Barnes’ hallmark. Everyone knows he’s good at this and that he focuses on this(sometimes to the detriment of the offense). It’s rare that you have to be concerned with this side of the ball with Barnes.
In-Game Adjustments: B-
This one is a mixed bag, partly because he doesn’t have to make a ton of adjustments against most teams. Barnes is usually good at forcing his style of play on other teams so adjustments are minor. When he does have to make major changes, he presses the right buttons more often than not…but sometimes he does it late(maybe out of stubbornness, maybe he thinks things will break his way, I’m not in his head).
Player Development: B
A big assist should go Todd Wright here(he’s worth a letter on his own), but that’s part of developing players: finding staff that will help in the process. Todd Wright notwithstanding, Barnes is good at building good defenders & rebounders but decidedly suspect at developing the offensive skillsets of players. Then there’s free throws; Tim had a good point about that awhile back that – I’m paraphrasing – it’s less a matter of Barnes not teaching proper free throw shooting(Barnes is an excellent free throw shooter himself) and more about the type of players he recruits; 9 times out of 10 he’ll pick the athletic player w/ a ton of potential over the decent player with solid shooting mechanics.
Recruiting: A
TJ, DJ, Durant, Tristan, the list goes on and on. He took a barren program & is now stocked full.
Running a Clean Program: A+
Considering just how shady the world of AAU is, the fact that Barnes has avoided NCAA violations speaks to his(and his staff’s) efforts at running a clean program. This is a major point in the basketball realm and needs to be given serious weight given how easy it is to run a dirty program(ask Baylor).

Overall that should put him at somewhere around a B+, which I think is fair. Between this and the data I posted above, I think it’s not terribly hard to put out an assertion that Barnes is a top 10-15 coach in the country…which I think is important, because if you’re interested in replacing him you have to consider the likelihood of landing someone better. The list of guys demonstrably better at handling a program of this size & stature is pretty small; further you have to consider that most of those that are demonstrably better are either in programs that are higher on the totem pole than Texas(Coach K, Bill Self, Izzo, Roy Williams) or they have their own warts(Calhoun & Calipari & their NCAA issues). You’ve essentially pared down your options to guys like Mark Few(Gonzaga), Billy Donovan(Florida, which if he’s turning down the NBA I don’t think he’s going anywhere), & maybe Ben Howland(UCLA)…or a ‘lower-tier’ guy that you’re taking a substantial risk on. There’s not a lot of upside and a whole lot of downside.

I understand the frustrations felt this time of year; I hated how the season ended as much as anyone. UT basketball means as much to me as football, which probably puts me in the minority amongst the UT faithful. I want nothing more than to see Texas win a national title in basketball. I think(hope?) Barnes can make it there; it’s a gut feeling, similar to what I felt about Mack for years. He just does things the right way & is this close to getting it. He may never actually win a title; there are tons of Hall of Fame-level coaches that go decades without winning a title. Bob Knight won his last NC in 1987 but coaches for another 20+ years, Jim Boeheim coached at Syracuse for 27 years before bringing home the trophy, Dean Smith won twice in 36 years at UNC, Lute Olsen won one in 27 years, and I’m sure most on here remember Roy Williams’ reputation at Kansas as a guy who ‘could never win the big one’. Hell, Eddie Sutton won over 800 games & never brought in a single NC. Coach K might go down as the best coach in D1 history and he’s got 4 titles in 31 years at Duke. I just named off probably 6 of the 10 greatest coaches in D1 history and they averaged 1 title every EIGHTEEN years between them. Winning a NC in basketball is HARD and it is RARE.

For me the question boils down to which you would rather have: 1) a program that’s consistently very good & is in the conversation for making a deep run every year, or 2) a program that has its ups & downs, every few years makes a deep run but some years misses the tourney entirely. If you’re looking for #1, you’ve probably got your best option already in the job right now; if you’re willing to take #2 then Barnes probably isn’t your guy.

That’s not the post of a Bitterwhiteguy. Great post.

I don’t have much time so I will keep it brief.

1. LHN is definitely affecting the fan base negatively. I didn’t see a game until a month into the season. I am still learning the players and the season is almost over.

2.We can make all of the excuses we want to for Barnes ( I am a Barnes fan) but you have to ask yourself how Baylor took a program on probation and suffering from the disruption of the murder that took place to one of the top programs in the nation in just five to six years. If they can do it, Barnes should be able to produce given all of the resources etc. he has.

3 Atmosphere at the games needs to change. Most other programs surround the court with crazed students and turn them loose on the opponent. We set a bunch of alumni that sit there tallying up their capital gains for the day instead of participating in the crowd noise. My kids say that you have to wait in line to get studen tickets and that you have to miss class most of the time to have any chance of getting in to the big games. They should be handing them out in class. Make that place get f#$%^&* crazy.

4. Before any body even hints at firing Rick Barnes, coach G for the womens bb team needs to be fired. She is horrible and they get worse each year. Start with her and then we start talking about other coaches.

Sorry, kinda blew it keeping it brief.