Texas Basketball: 3 reasons why Chris Beard was the perfect hire

Track record of postseason success

Something Longhorns fans are starving for on the hardwood after six seasons under Smart as head coach of the program is some degree of postseason. If you want to count the Big 12 Tournament title for Smart and the Longhorns in the season that was, than that does count as a significant postseason accomplishment.

Otherwise, Smart was largely inept for the Longhorns in the postseason during his six years at the helm as head coach. He held an NCAA Tournament record of 0-3 during his six seasons on the Forty Acres, all of which came to pretty mediocre teams. Texas lost to the likes of the seven-seed Nevada Wolfpack, 11-seed Northern Iowa Panthers, and 14-seed Abilene Christian, during Smart’s tenure.

Beard found a lot more postseason success during his five years as the Texas Tech head coach than Smart did in six years in Austin. Texas Tech made it to the National Championship Game to round out the 2018-19 season, and who knows what he could’ve done last season had the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic not ended the season before the NCAA Tournament even began.

Texas Tech did also win one more game in the NCAA Tournament than the Longhorns did this season. Granted the Red Raiders were close to knocking off the three-seed Arkansas Razorbacks in the Round of 32 last week.

Beard made it to the NCAA Tournament in all but one season during his six years as a college hoops head coach now between his time with Texas Tech and Arkansas-Little Rock.