Texas Basketball: What’s next for Longhorns after stunning ACU loss
What to do about Shaka Smart’s hot seat?
The biggest looming topic of discussion pertaining to this Texas men’s hoops program following the loss to the Wildcats in the Round of 64 is what will happen with Smart and his coaching staff. There were already whispers about Smart’s hot seat heading into this weird college hoops season, and this loss in the Big Dance did not help his case at all.
Smart and the Longhorns were rolling heading into the postseason. They won their final three games of the regular season slate. And then they extended their winning streak to five games by beating Oklahoma State and Texas Tech to win the Big 12 Tournament crown.
It’s no slight accomplishment that Texas won their first Big 12 Tournament title in program history. Smart looked like he really had turned a corner up through Selection Sunday. Texas had by far their highest seed in the NCAA Tournament in the six seasons under Smart’s direction too.
But in the end, the Longhorns were still unable to come away with their first win in the Big Dance under Smart as head coach. Texas is now 0-3 in three attempts under Smart in the NCAA Tournament.
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And those three aforementioned tourney losses for Smart and the Longhorns aren’t good ones by any means. No loss is really a good one, but falling short at the hands of the 11-seed Northern Iowa Panthers, seven-seed Nevada Wolfpack, and 14-seed Abilene Christian, is definitely nothing to write home about. Watching how Texas performs in the postseason under Smart was really tough to watch.