Overlooked by Football, but UH Hoops Has Bright Future

Cougar Hoops on Spot with Move to Big East, But Future Looks Good

For much of the life in Conference USA the basketball story was essentially Memphis and all the other guys. Oh sure, every so often Houston or someone else made some noise, but Memphis was the big dog and usually the only conference rep making the NCAA field.


Things are about to change for the Houston Cougars. They won’t have to worry just one team to overcome. The Cougars will have to beat a number of schools to reach the top. They are joining the Big East. Defending national champion, Connecticut, plays there. So does Louisville, Cincinnati, Marquette, Notre Dame, Georgetown, Depaul, Villanova and others schools perhaps not so basketball famous.


All the attention about the school’s move to the Big East revolves around getting the football program into a BCS automatic qualifying league. With the future defections of West Virginia to the Big 12 and both Pitt and Syracuse to the ACC there could be some question whether the Big East can hold onto its automatic football spot.


There is no question the league will continue to be one of the top loops in basketball. But while that may put added pressure on coach James Dickey, his staff and team it is not all bad. It is not really bad at all.


For one thing the Big East will get multiple post season basketball bids. Unlike C-USA where winning the post season was the only guarantee for the NCAA tourney, in the Big East the only question will be how many schools go to the tourney.


The Cougars are in a good spot. Under Dickey they have have recruited well the past two seasons. The incoming class is ranked as one of the best in the country and best at UH in years. The school has committed to find a way to upgrade basketball facilities including giving Hofheinz Pavilion an upgrade. While that won’t happen until funds can be found and the football upgrades paid for and perhaps underway, Dickey still has to continuing to build the program.


He inherited a team coming off an NCAA bid in Tom Penders final season a couple years back. Pender’s clubs were built heavily with junior college transfers and others from out of state. Dickey’s team this season has only one player not from Texas or an adjoining state. He also has ten freshmen or sophomores on his 15 player full roster. He has four junior college or college transfers and only one senior.


The Cougars off their narrow five point loss at Oklahoma on Saturday are only 4-5. However in the five losses the margin is only 12 points. They won a big game at Arkansas earlier, but have lost by two points at home to Oakland, one point at home to TCU and one point at home to LSU. Their other loss was by three points at Texas State.


Losing to teams like Texas State and Oakland (that is a school from Michigan, by the way) is not impressive, but perhaps only because they don’t have established big names.


It won’t be long, however, that Houston won’t be losing to the Oaklands of the world. James Dickey has recruited some strong players who only need experience. And with success and the cover of being a member of the prestigious Big East Conference the recruits and fans will come. Two of his younger players to know on the current team who should be around for the conference change are leading scorer Alandise Harris and top rebounder TaShawn Thomas. Harris is a 6’6” sophomore from Little Rock. 6’8” freshman TaShawn Thomas from Kileen. Harris averages just under 15 points and six rebounds per game. Thomas averages ten points and a team leading 8.7 rebounds per contest. Jonathan Simmons and Kirk VanSlyke are double figure scorers. The Cougars average 78.9 points per game while allowing 70.3.

Attendance at Hofheinz Pavilion has not been consistently good since the days of Phi Slama Jama when the Cougars routinely out drew the Rockets. Folks, that was more than 25 years ago! Winning will make it better. Houston is averaging 3456 a game for the first six. The average will rise as C-USA play begins. It will be better yet in the Big East.


So, while the Big East—and facilities upgrades at UH in both football and basketball are still in the future—the future looks good on Cullen Boulevard.