This one significantly stings.
Not just because a Final Four bid was there for the taking (It was.).
Not just because a win would have meant a massive home-court advantage next weekend (It would have been.).
Not just because the team played so well for the first 30 minutes of the game (It did).
All three of those things add to the sting, but more than anything, the thing that makes Sunday's 88-81 loss to Miami so achingly painful is that this team had become so enjoyable to love. It had overcome so much. Accomplished so much. Soared so high. All with a head coach no one could have ever guessed would emerge as its leader. All with a group of players that reminded us all just how good the highs of major college athletics can feel when things come together.
So many things went against this team on Sunday, from losing its best player from the last couple of weeks to injury to some harsh officiating decisions that went against Texas to running into a team that had more experience in this exact situation than UT did.
Yet, ultimately the loss came down to the fact that this team that we believed could do anything, couldn't execute in the final eight minutes. It blinked and flinched and stumbled and collapsed.
It doesn't mean that it isn’t one of the best basketball teams the University of Texas has ever produced (It is), but it means that the end of its story is filled with enough mistakes that it lost right before it truly accomplish something historic.
Damnit, it stings.
Yet, I'm reminded of the saying, "Tis better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all."
As much heartache that exists tonight, there's no doubt that loving this group was worth it.
Thank you, fellas.
No. 2 - Oh, and one last thing about Texas Hoops ...
Give Rodney Terry a four-year contract to be the head basketball coach tomorrow.
No. 3 - NCAA Tournament Musings ...
... UConn and Miami is going to be a hellacious game.
... I thought the refs got the end of the San Diego State/Creighton game correct. It looked like a foul in real time. If you grab a guy in the air, even if just a little, you have to expect that the whistle is going to blow.
... Florida Atlantic is some kind of team. Thirty-five wins entering the Final Four. That's just incredible.
... I'm not sure how much I'm ever going to care about high school recruiting in college basketball ever again after this tournament. Experience matters more than anything and one and done players don't give that to you.
... Give me UConn over FAU in the final.
No. 4 - Spring Football Notes ...
I'm not sure that I'm going to write anything that's better than
@Alex Dunlap's scrimmage report from Saturday, but these are things rolling around in my head after two weeks of workouts.
a. There's no need to hit the panic button on the 2022 offensive line class, but it's notable that sources have indicated that this group of young players is mostly playing like ... a bunch of young players. It's a reminder that if you're cooking a frozen pizza that calls for it to be cooked at 400 degrees for 25 minutes, turning the oven up to 450 degrees and cooking it for 10 minutes isn't going to work well, no matter how hungry you are. Everyone is just going to need to be more patient with offensive linemen than any other position on the team. You have to give them more than 12-18 months of developmental time before making large conclusions.
b. It says a lot about Cam Williams to me that he's ahead of what one could reasonably expect his developmental time to be. That's not to say he won't still be developing in the years to come, but that he's played his way into serious playing time consideration this early is pretty exciting.
c. DJ Campbell might be a five-star and he might very well have a great career in front of him when the light switch fully flicks on, but Steve Sarkisian didn't just give him playing time last year because he was a five-star recruit and it's hard not to get the sense that part of the Williams buzz from within the program is a stick being waved at Campbell. If he's going to be the starter or play a lot, it's not going to be by default. It's going to be because he's playing really well. Consistently.
d. Arch Manning is going to be the No. 2 quarterback for this team. It's not a knock on Maalik Murphy. It's an acknowledgement that Manning wasn't the No. 1 overall prospect in the country last year for nothing. He's really, really good.
e. There's nothing about Quinn Ewers' off-season thus far that I'm not a fan of. I'm not sure there's a lot he can answer right now that will tell us just how good he will be this season, but he's not leaving meat on the bone with his time, commitment, energy and practice play. That's all you can ask of a young man.
f. Love what I'm hearing with regard to the early impact Chris Jackson is having on the field. Sarkisian didn't hire a babysitter, he hired a guy that holds players accountable and has already gained confidence from his group of players that he will make them better if they listen to what's coming out of his mouth.
g. I have no idea what to expect from the Buck/Edge position. I don't get the sense that anyone should be making definitive comments about what will happen there. It feels like anyone looking for answers to questions here before August might be wasting their angst.
h. I somewhat feel the same about running back. I once assumed that Jonathan Brooks would definitely be RB1, but I just don't know anymore. Maybe it goes down like that, but this feels like a position that is going to work itself out in the first three weeks of the season.
i. It's such a strange feeling not to have a single concern about the starting left tackle position. I haven't felt the way I feel about Kelvin Banks toward another Texas offensive lineman since Leonard Davis was on campus.
j. If there was a game tomorrow, it feels like the coaches would feel good about playing with Banks, Christian Jones, Hayden Conner, Jake Majors, Cole Hutson (when he returns) and Cam Williams. That's six players. There have been a lot of seasons when Teas didn't have six guys that it could count on. It's going to be up to Campbell and others to play their way into that group of trusted players.
k. We've been asked about redshirt freshman Neto Umeozulu a few times over the last couple of weeks. All I can tell you is that the people we've talked to love his future after more development, but he's not yet in the conversation with the trusted players I just listed. The staff is going to demand more of him, similar to Campbell.
l. This stood out to me from Alex's report.. "Bo Davis coaches freshman DL Sydir Mitchell harder than any other defensive lineman. He is constantly berating him." You know what's not easy for an upperclassman to take, let alone a true freshman who has been on campus for 15 minutes. Being able to take hard coaching/instruction is a skill and it makes me feel very hopeful about Mitchell going forward. A lot of people questioned Mitchell in the recruiting process because of his weight, but being wired to take the worst from Davis leads me to believe he's likely getting the same treatment from Torre Becton and the S&C staff. Some dudes would just go home. Attaboy, Sydir. Keep grinding, young man.
m. I'm worried about the linebacker position. Maybe I'll feel different by August, but in March ... this is how I feel.
n. Christian Jones working with young players after practice on their kick-slides is the stuff of ... a future captain? That young man has come a long way in the last couple of years.
No. 5 - About Colin Simmons recruitment ...
If you held a gun to my head and asked me to make a Colin Simmons prediction at this very moment, I'd pick LSU
That acknowledgement out of the way, there are reasons to believe that the Longhorns are making up ground in his recruitment. In fact, I think this is evolving into an eventual Texas vs. LSU battle for the five-star pass rusher.
For all of the LSU buzz, and let's be clear ... he did visit Baton Rouge last year for the LSU/Southern U. game instead of attending the Texas/Alabama game ... he has still visited Texas FIVE times in the last 14 months, which is twice as many visits than any other school has received by my count. That includes LSU.
For those not keeping score, Simmons has visited Texas on the following dates:
1/22/22 (Texas Junior Day)
4/16/22 (Texas practice)
6/11/22 (Texas summer camp)
11/12/22 (Texas/TCU game)
3/25/23 (Texas Junior Day)
Before it's all said and done, Simmons will likely take an official visit to Texas and potentially another visit or two, depending on when he makes a decision.
On top of that, Simmons has said things recently about Texas that screams of the kind of things you'd hear from a future Texas commit. Check out this comment he made in an interview with an On3 national reporter Chad Simmons:
"Playing for your in-state team, that's basically what it's all about. They're trying to get all the DFW kids to Texas."
Two things stand out about that:
a. Texas is the in-state school in his mind. He'll visit A&M in a few weeks, but just remember who he believes is THE in-state team.
b. Texas' recruiting in the DFW has caught his eye. If the Longhorns can keep their recruiting at a high level, especially in the DFW area, it's the kind of thing that could play very well in the pursuit of Simmons.
Ultimately, it's going to come down to selling Simmons on his place in the Texas defense and while the Longhorns have recruited the position well in the last two years, they haven’t had anyone step up yet on the depth chart to scare anyone away. The fact that LSU's position coach and primary recruiter just departed for the NFL doesn't hurt Texas' chances.
Finally, the kid likes my tweets.
No. 6 - Sweeeeeeep ...
I suppose an important question was answered this weekend.
Beating slump-busters definitely has a value.
After a few weeks of beating up on teams without a pulse, the Longhorns played a team with a strong pulse in their conference-opening series and for three straight games, the Longhorns looked like a team playing for something important instead of playing in a wasted season.
Ladies and gentlemen, they've played themselves into a possible Big 12 title-contending team. Oh, the bullpen is still a nervous breakdown waiting to happen, but there were so many good things that happened in a three-game sweep of No. 14 Texas Tech.
From my vantage point, the season officially began this weekend.
No. 7 - Holy Mother of Athletic Freaks ...
It just feels like 2025 Duncanville wide receiver DaKoriean Moore deserves his own section this week after posting the No. 1 long jump in the nation this week ... just one week after he ran a 10.63 (in 50-degree weather in March) at the Texas Southern Relays.
This is Roy Williams stuff, except he's doing the Roy Williams stuff as a 10th grader.
I'm literally out of words. This is unprecedented stuff. We might be looking at the rare 6-star kid. Hell, maybe a 7-star kid.
No. 8 – BUY or SELL …
(Sell) Nothing seems imminent, but I think the coaches know that several players who visited this weekend will eventually commit.
(Buy) Not really a buy or sell question, but I've already put in a futurecast for the Longhorns a couple of weeks ago. I don't know how to put a percentage on it. Maybe 85%.
(Buy) There's not even a true No. 2 right now as far as I can tell. Everyone just needs to relax.
(Buy) Sure, it's in the neighborhood.
(Sell) Not by the end of the summer.
(Sell) I think everyone needs to stop bringing it up. He was great to have around for a year and I think the program was obviously better for it, but the future success of this program is not connected to his being around or not.
(Sell) I don't think I'm secretive about the optimism that should exist for this team. It should play for a Big 12 title in December.
(Sell) There's some "nuance" to the conversation because it probably comes down to the intent of the person making the comment. Sometimes it's more about someone going out of their way to be an asshole than anything else. After all these years, I’m mostly numb to it all, but I'll admit that if you catch me at the wrong moment, I'll get agitated about it. I suppose I should take it as a compliment when these moments are brought up because from my perspective, I write between 300,000-500,000 words per year on more topics than I can dare to count. Yet, when people want to take a dig at me, the references are seven years old (permission to dream big), nine years old (85%) and 12 years old (It's Austin), respectively. Whether my haters would ever admit it or not, I get a lot more right than wrong ... otherwise it would be thrown in my face.
By the way, Skaka is a damn good coach. He's literally a finalist for National Coach of the Year this year.
(Sell) The 2005 team has the edge at running back and offensive line. The 2023 team has the edge at receiver. The tight end position is a push. The thing that can't be re-created by the 2023 team is that the 2005 team had the greatest college player of all-time playing quarterback.
No. 9 - Scattershooting on anything and everything ...
... I have a feeling we're going to be a frustrated group of people on the night of the first round of the NFL Draft. There's likely to be a lot of names taken before Bijan Robinson that aren't remotely better at football than he is.
... Am I the only one that doesn't completely understand the Tyree Wilson hype train? Don't get me wrong, he's a very good player, but a top-5 pick? I feel like someone is going to make a mistake with that selection in the top 10, but I'd love to be wrong because I like pulling for kids from Texas. I really will want him to succeed, but I just don't quite think he's that good.
... Luka is eventually going to demand a trade from the Mavs. I don't mean to anger Mavs fans, but he's starting to talk about how he's losing his fun in playing in the last month. It might not happen tomorrow. Or this year. But, as someone with no skin in the game, you can see it coming from a mile away.
... This will go down as one of the all-time hands in the history of poker. AA vs. KK vs. KK for nearly $800,000. It's a true holy &^%$balls moment.
... RIP, WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play. It was one hell of a parting shot this weekend.
... I can't believe it took as long as it did for Antonio Conte and Tottenham to part ways. His last press conference was him begging for it to be his final moment as the coach. Buyer beware to the next club that wants a piece of that.
... Is the Houston Dynamo the best MLS team in Texas right now?
... Jonathan Majors being arrested for allegedly hitting his girlfriend is one thing, but
having multiple people step forward after the arrest to say that he's an awful human being is incredibly disappointing. It's going to be interesting to see what the fallout for this situation is going to be.
... I'm not sure anything got me in my feels this weekend as much as an old clip of Jimmy Stewart reading a poem about his dog Beau on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson.
No. 10 - The List: Keanu Reeves Top 10 ...
A couple of things....
a. John Wick 4 came out this weekend and while I haven't seen it, I've heard pretty incredible reviews.
b. I
did a Reeves list four years ago and upon second glance, I did a bad job of making the list. It happens.
Therefore, I'm taking a second shot at it.
Let's get to it.
Honorable Mention: River's Edge, Parenthood, Dangerous Liaisons, The Replacements, Hardball and A Walk in the Clouds,
10. Toy Story 4
9. Something's Gotta Give
All Keanu does in this movie is woo Diane Keaton with such grace that by the end of the movie you're almost ready to scream at her for going back to Jack Nicholson.
8. The Devil's Advocate
I will stand on a table and defend every part of this movie until every detractor shuts the hell up.
7. John Wick: Chapter 2
Some will strongly argue that it should be ranked ahead of the original.
6. Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure
5. My Own Private Idaho
One of the best pieces of acting that Reeves has ever delivered. This movie is better today than the day it was released.
4. John Wick
Some people will argue that Chapter 2 is better than the original, but I'm not in the camp. Not only do I prefer the first release, but it has to be acknowledged as the birthplace of one of the most unexpected franchise success stories in cinema over the last couple of decades. We're talking about one of the best action movies of all-time at this point.
3. Speed
This movie is still a straight up banger. Quentin Tarantino called it one of the 20 best films he's seen from 1992 to 2009. Roger Evert gave it 4 out of 4 stars.
2. Point Break
It's a masterpiece that is as good today as it was when it was first released.
1. The Matrix
Look, I probably prefer watching Point Break over every movie on this list, but it's undeniable that The Matrix is one of the greatest science fiction movies ever made. As much as I love Johnny Utah, Point Break hasn't had 1/10th the cultural impact over the course of the last three decades.
