Texas Basketball: 3 reasons why Chris Beard was the perfect hire
Recruiting and player retention
A big looming concern for the Longhorns this offseason is going to be their ability to retain most of the talent and production from the roster from the 2020-21 team. Texas is already looking like they’ll lose the likes of senior versatile standout guard Matt Coleman, senior big man Jericho Sims, sophomore breakthrough power forward Kai Jones, and maybe freshman power forward Greg Brown.
Jones has already declared for the NBA Draft following the abrupt end to his sophomore campaign. And it looks like Coleman and Sims will be taking their talents to the next level despite the NCAA’s ruling to let them come back and keep one more year of eligibility. Texas has also seen senior big man Royce Hamm and sophomore shooting guard/wing Donovan Williams enter the NCAA Transfer Portal since Smart’s departure.
Texas might be able to lessen the roster attrition early this offseason now that they’ve made a very prominent head coach hiring in Beard, and they did it very soon after Smart took the head coaching job at Marquette. The success on the recruiting trail might not take too much of a dip in the near future either.
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One early storyline to watch for Beard and the Longhorns on the recruiting trail for the 2021 class is the potential that he could get back the commit/signing of the talented four-star IMG Academy shooting guard Tamar Bates. The former highest-rated commit/signee in the Longhorns 2021 class request a release from his letter of intent earlier this week.