i am extremely gruntled with the assistants we are bringing in. it's easily the no.1 reason that i'm not unavoidably focused on our lack of, you know, an actual basketball team. even if this next year suuuuucks (watch us have a Bad News Bears roster that trounces Shaka's Jarrett Allen-led 11-win roster), there is every reason to believe that recruiting is going to be out of this world going forward, and that Chris Beard will be able to maximize said talent. i mean shit, i hate doing this- i always try my best to be the last guy who goes full-on blinders/uber positive just because we have a new coach, but just look at the bona fides of our new HC/assistants. these guys are all known commodities. Beard is not fucking around at all.
what i'm about to say should in no way be interpreted as me saying that the 2023-24 Longhorns are the CBB equivalent of the 2016 Cubs, BUT- the only other time i've ever felt this way regarding a regime change was when the Cubs brought in Theo Epstein and Joe Maddon, and we all obviously know that in that instance it *did* result in a championship. That said, CBB titles are exceedingly difficult to win. A sampling of head coaches with one NCAA title:
Phog Allen, Frank McGuire, Pete Newell, Al McGuire, John Thompson, Rollie Massimino, Larry Brown, Lute Olsen, Jim Boeheim, Tom Izzo (Tom fucking Izzo!!!), Bill Self (best HC in NCAA last 20 years), John Calipari, and more.
I think that people around here are so used to crushing Barnes for never winning a title that they've all forgotten/never realized how difficult it is to win one. Chris Beard doesn't need to win a national title at Texas to be a huge success, or even to be the best coach in program history. BUT- with his resume, and the work that his assistants have done in the past, plus the financial commitment from CDC, I cannot help but believing that Texas Basketball winning the national title could actually become a reality, as admittedly difficult and unlikely as that is. In my opinion, the Chris Beard era at Texas is off to an outstanding start.