40 Acres Sports

Great coverage of the Gail Goestenkors hire from TexasSports. Includes video from the press conference.

Kentucky has a press conference scheduled, reportedly to announce Billy Gillispie as their new coach.

It’s been a crazy day for Texas basketball fans. Depending on who you asked and when you asked the question, the answer was different every time. [tag]Rick Barnes[/tag] was either not interested, very interested, or already in contract talks for the open coaching position with the University of Kentucky.

Reports from early this afternoon were that Barnes was very interested in the job and that he was Kentucky’s second choice (behind Florida’s Billy Donovan), there was actually lots of noise that he was as good as gone. Either those reports were erroneous or something changed. The latest and most official news is that Rick Barnes will be back next year as the head basketball coach for the University of Texas.

Texas coach Rick Barnes on Thursday said he plans on being the Longhorns coach next season, shooting down speculation that he would entertain leaving for Kentucky’s vacant head coaching job. “I’m the Texas basketball coach,” Barnes said.

Great news for Texas fans. It sounds like Texas AD DeLoss Dodds and Barnes were able to work out more than just a pay raise to keep him in Austin. He and his entire staff deserve everything they get. Or maybe there was no raise but Kevin Durant called him up and told him he’d be back if Barnes was back. I can dream. There’s got to be at least a slightly higher chance KD comes back to school now. At the very least the Horns will have their basketball coach back and don’t have to worry about any current players or recruits wanting out.

My favorite rumor of the afternoon: Barnes to Kentucky and Texas A&M savior Billy Clyde Gillispie to Austin to replace him. As much as I would’ve hated to lose Barnes, the meltdown in Aggieland would have been hilarious and might have made it worth it. Though the Aggies are still screwed. Since Barnes passed on Kentucky, Gillispie is now the favorite there and he’s not likely to pass on the job. Texas A&M sources are already telling ESPN he’s gone. Now I can actually root for the guy.

No matter how everything went down, the Longhorns came very close to losing an incredible basketball coach today. Barnes is nowhere near a perfect coach, but he’s turned the Texas Longhorns into a marquee basketball program and Texas fans should be ecstatic that he’ll be back next year.

Lady Horns lose star Tiffany Jackson, but Conradt left Gail Goestenkors four starters.

Is Bob Huggins one and done at K-State? He may be headed to West Virginia. (Update)

LaMarcus Aldridge to undergo tests to discover source of dizziness. Could be a heart issue. Hope nothing is wrong.

Creighton’s Dana Altman took Arkansas job. Then he visited Fayetteville and changed his mind.

Gail Goestenkors is reportedly leaving Duke for Texas. Very nice replacement for Conradt.

I keep telling myself not to get my hopes up, but check this nugget buried in a Sam Smith article (BugMeNot) from the Chicago Tribune:

The pros are beginning to believe Texas’ [tag]Kevin Durant[/tag] may stay another year in college but not Ohio State’s Greg Oden after his foul trouble in the NCAA tournament and horrible coaching. The consensus is few big men have been more poorly used than Oden in Ohio State’s deliberate system, basically putting Oden in foul trouble and not allowing him to use his dominance to start the fast break by rebounding and dishing outlet passes.

Who knows how it’ll end up playing out, probably not even Durant himself, but I’m definitely happy to hear there’s a chance he’ll come back to Texas for one more season. I’m also glad he’s reported keeping his options open by continuing to attend class. Hopefully, he and his family can take out a huge insurance policy and make it about what they think is best for Kevin and not have to worry too much about the money.

Man are those guys ever going to figure out this crap is why the entire country mocks them incessantly? They held a miniature yell practice trying to convince coach Billy Gillispie to stay at Texas A&M and not move on to a better job. Only about 70 students and other morons fans showed up (the 150 number quoted in the story is BS) and Coach Gillispie was not even in the state. The rally lasted ten minutes and embarrassed all who were in attendance.

So sad, but I guess they’ll claim it worked since Gillispie will reportedly be returning to the Aggies. It couldn’t possibly be the money, it has to be that two dozen weirdos showed up outside his office and yelled things to an empty building.