Texas head coach Rodney Terry is a good basketball coach. That much seems evident through two seasons in Austin. Whether or not he is good enough at roster building is up for debate.
Terry is 4-2 in the NCAA tournament at Texas. An Elite Eight finish and Big 12 tournament title headline Terry’s accomplishments on the Forty Acres. If given a talented roster, he can guide it to tournament wins. That his current team won a game in March Madness is impressive in its own right.
The team that Terry assembled for the 2023-24 campaign was lacking. It was incomplete because of a lackluster effort in the portal or an inability to close enough big time players. They were certainly available in the last transfer portal class. Texas just didn’t bring in the same volume of quality players it brought in over the prior two offseasons.
The last portal class didn’t yield a guard combo of Marcus Carr and Sir’Jabari Rice. It didn’t come close. There was no alpha forward or leader like Timmy Allen. A successful portal haul has to include a lot more of players like that for the Longhorns this offseason.
To his credit, Terry has an excellent recruiting class. Five-star shooting guard Tre Johnson headlines a class that includes two other big time players in Cam Scott and Nicolas Codie. Three freshmen likely aren’t going to transform the Texas basketball team on their own. They will probably need more help.
Texas has to do better in the transfer portal this offseason. It can’t afford to pass or fail to sign prospects like Arizona guard Caleb Love and Tennessee guard Dalton Knecht who we wrote about last offseason. Those players are still playing. The Longhorns are watching at home.
How Rodney Terry approaches this transfer portal will indicate whether or not his roster building philosophy has changed. It might need to change if Texas wants to get back to playing after the first weekend.