Texas Basketball: Darren Rovell thinks Shaka Smart should be fired

Following a tragic loss for the three-seed and Big 12 Champion Texas basketball and head coach Shaka Smart, the hot seat discussions are really ramping up. Texas entered their Round of 64 meeting with the 14-seed Abilene Christian Wildcats and head coach Joe Goulding as a sizable nine-point favorite.

Few thought that when Smart and the Longhorns went into the locker room at halftime with a lead of five points, and with momentum on their side, that they would not take advantage in the second half. Yet, Texas struggled to put any distance between themselves and the Wildcats at any point in this game.

A big reason why the Longhorns couldn’t separate from the Wildcats in the end was rampant turnovers. Texas turned the ball over a season-high 23 times. They had five more turnovers in this game than they had field goals made. That will never be a winning formula in college hoops, especially in the NCAA Tournament.

The hot seat for Texas basketball head coach Shaka Smart

Following the loss to ACU, there’s a lot of discussions surrounding the hot seat of the Longhorns sixth-year head coach Smart. Texas is now 0-3 in the postseason under Smart as their head coach. And this is just the latest bit of disappointment in a saga that can’t get away from this team and coaching staff in the postseason.

A post on the Twitter timeline of Darren Rovell of The Action Network on the early morning of March 21 expressed that Smart should be on the hot seat entering this offseason. That kind of post on social media from Rovell is just one expression of the disappointment that the entire Longhorns hoops fan base felt on the night of March 20.

It seems like it is now a yearly discussion as to whether Texas athletic director Chris del Conte should hang onto Smart or let him go. The hot seat discussion for Smart is very tiresome and something that looked like it could go away for most of this season.

Although the Longhorns finished up this season with a record of 19-8 (11-6 Big 12), and with a Big 12 Tournament crown to their name, the overshadowing theme will still be postseason disappointment. Getting the first Big 12 Tournament title in program history is a big deal, but falling short in the Round of 64 yet again is an even bigger one.

Smart would be entering his seventh year as the Longhorns head coach if CDC keeps him around heading into next season. This will be a long ongoing discussion that isn’t likely to end anytime soon with Smart still having a successful 2020-21 campaign before the NCAA Tournament began.