Texas Basketball: Re-engaging after a rage quit (or three)

People who are familiar with video games (I am a child of the 80s, after all) may well have heard of rage quitting. 

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It’s a pretty simple concept, really. Video game not going how you want it to? Throw your controller against the wall/couch/autographed photo of Bobby Knight and turn off the console before the game is actually over.

Now, you might not be a video games player, but I’d bet money most everybody on this board has rage quit something.

If the quarterback from your favorite team throws his fourth interception of the game and you turn off the TV before whipping the remote control onto the floor? You’ve rage quit!

If your boss at work tells you that you have to stay late to help them work on a presentation for the next day that they haven’t started and you walk out? You’ve rage quit!

If, during the early stages of a long car ride with your family, your kids have been yelling at each other for hours and you decide to, quite literally, turn the car around and go back home? Yep… rage quit!

But what if you’re Texas Basketball?

Well, rage quitting probably seems a bit more reasonable at that point.

Shaka Smart’s best team in Austin drops a First Round game to 14-seed Abilene Christian? 

Chris Beard gets arrested as part of an ugly, public dispute and is fired for cause?

Rodney Terry can’t find the magic of his Elite Eight run and sees a first-round exit followed by a loss in the play-in?

Rage quit!

Three coaches come and gone over the last four years. All for differing levels of legitimate reasons. And, while your mileage may vary with each individual decision, it’s pretty simple to understand that somebody high up had had enough and didn’t feel the need to put up with Smart, Beard, or Terry anymore.

But where does that leave us? 

With former Xavier and Arizona and Xavier (again) coach Sean Miller, that’s where.

Miller’s Xavier team that made it to the Sweet Sixteen in 2023 where they were bested by an interim Terry squad notwithstanding, Miller is at Texas because of what he accomplished during his 12 years in Tucson. 

Those 12 years brought three Elite Eights and five Pac-12 championships. No small feat. 

However, the landscape shift of college basketball between 2021 and today might as well put us all on Saturn. 

It’s just not the same.

So, in honor of the three rage(ish) quits that came before Miller, I’d like to take a look at three Big Picture Items I’ll be paying attention to in Miller’s first year on the 40 Acres.

Item #1: Offensive Identity

You’re going to hear about how fast Miller’s teams play. And they do… sometimes.

You’ll also hear that his teams employ pro-style looks. And they do… mostly.

But his most successful offensive teams at both Arizona and Xavier were dependent on how often fast break and transition offense came out of their defensive possessions.

This was aided, with the Wildcats particularly, by the fact that Miller’s teams consistently had some of the best rebounders in the country. In fact, only once between 2010 and 2018 did Arizona finish outside the top 35 teams in the country in rebounding percentage and efficiency. 

But there’s a problem. 

What if your frontcourt is pretty average as I am expecting this year’s Texas team’s to be? Can a coach that wants to push tempo in transition off of makes or turnovers find ways to cultivate that tempo if his team is negative on the glass? Just how big of a reliance does Miller plan on putting on those transition moments?

And what about his playmakers? Can Tramon Mark and Jordan Pope facilitate Miller’s preferred half-court offensive looks that focus on ball reversals/skips, high-quality shot selection and finding cutters away from the ball?

Every coach deserves a few years to build and develop their system and players, but while Miller has proven to be adaptable with pieces of his offensive identity, he’s also had the luxury of employing high level front courts that filter action directly to his core belief of pushing pace when possible.

How will he enable high-efficiency if that cornerstone is less than stable?

Item #2: In-Season Development

If you’re a sicko like me, it’s not the big names that Miller coached at Arizona like Aaron Gordon or Lauri Markkanen that have me excited for the long-term potential of his teams at Texas.

Instead, it’s the prospects of Miller turning more players into new-age versions of guys like Solomon Hill, Gabe York and TJ McConnell. 

Listen, Texas’s NIL spending will be competitive, but it won’t be bank-busting. Whoever is coaching at Texas will have access to quality players, but if you’re banking on the Longhorns having their pick of the top four or five players they covet each year out of the portal/high school ranks, it’s likely you’ll need to think again.

Luckily, in Miller, there’s a track record of finding/cultivating development.

But it’s been awhile. Zero Xavier players brought in by Miller were drafted during his three years back in Cincinnati.

Experience tells me that while overall success isn’t always immediately obvious, player development generally is.

Does Pope’s playmaking take a step? Does Mark’s?

Does Chendall Weaver finally show the overall offensive game he’s shown hints at during his last two years in Austin?

How long does it take for Dailyn Swain to prove he’s a keeper at this level? Does Matas Vokietaitis show signs that he’s better this coming February than he is right now in November?

If those things are happening? If Miller proves he can develop right away and give donors reason to believe he can live up to the hype surrounding him a decade ago? Look out.

Fingers crossed. 

Item #3: Big Game Sean?

This might be hard to believe (and y’all deserve to know the caveat that this does not include Pac-12 or NCAA Tournament games), but in 12 seasons as the coach at Arizona, Miller’s teams went 16-17 against ranked opponents. 

First, it’s wild to me how few Pac-12 teams were consistently ranked through the years. As a comparison, the most ranked opponents Arizona played in a season under Miller was five. If you take that same time frame and look at Texas’ schedule, the FEWEST ranked opponents they played in a regular season was six. The most Texas played in a regular season… 13!

Now, certainly the Big East has had its fair share of quality teams over the last three years, but there’s no debating that Miller’s record against Top 25 opponents during the regular season has been kinda lackluster. 

The counter is that his teams have had success during the NCAA Tournament (a metric many here would gladly trade for).

However, have his teams’ NCAA seeds been propped up by records less tarnished by losses thanks to weaker competition? 

I mean, 16-17 is a fact.

Luckily for him, he gets a chance to make a statement towards that data right off the rip, as Duke is pretty firmly in the top 10 according to most publications.

The Endgame

Miller can coach. 

Texas, for as long as he’s in charge, will be competent.

But this new landscape is different. And, it’s not a certainty that Miller will be the beneficiary of having better players than his conference foes, placing a priority on the exact things noted above.

Can he cultivate an efficient offensive system that works against the best teams in the country week in and week out? Twelve teams from the SEC are rated inside of KenPom’s top 40. And the team rated 12th…you guessed it… Texas.

Can he prove, kinda immediately, that players will grow and develop at significant clips under his tutelage?

Can he prove that he has what it takes to prepare his players to win their share (or more) of the big games they play?

Looking forward to learning the answers and interacting with you all this season.

Thanks for reading, friends.