SAN FRANCISCO — Grant McCasland wanted more time.
More time in the locker room following the Texas Tech basketball team's 84-79 loss to Florida in the Elite Eight. Time on the road with his team, traveling to San Antonio for the Final Four. Time to reflect on what the Red Raiders achieved in his second year as head coach.
Time is something college basketball coaches rarely have these days. The transfer portal has been open for a week. Revenue sharing and NIL, recruiting and scouting are going to dominate McCasland's life until, well, he has the next version of the Texas Tech Red Raiders set.
Losing in the Elite Eight was going to be a punch in the gut regardless of how it happened. It doesn't help that the Red Raiders let a 10-point lead slip away, that their two best players, Darrion Williams and JT Toppin, missed crucial free throws and inside buckets to keep the door open for Florida. I
In the immediate, those are the talking points for Texas Tech fans, how close they were to living every supporter's March Madness dreams of the Final Four.
But it would be easy to look at Saturday's game in the Chase Center, stomp your feet and complain about your luck. Poor old Texas Tech, right?
Before doing that, take a pause and remember what this basketball team was two years ago today, before McCasland arrived on the scene. Back-to-back head coaches, cut from the same cloth, left under less-than-ideal circumstances. What was a budding program in the middle of nowhere in West Texas had quickly turned to ruin, immediate action being needed to salvage what could've been a doomed situation if left unattended for too long.
In his introductory press conference, McCasland said he believed he could win a national championship at Texas Tech. In his second year in Lubbock, he assembled a team good enough to do just that.
Winning a national title is ridiculously hard. Ask the coach Texas Tech knocked out in the Sweet 16. John Calipari is considered one of the best to ever do it, and he has one national title to his name. So does Tom Izzo, at least for now.
