March 10, 2007

Big on roundball
Basketball in Texas, where football has always been king, has become huge with success of Big 12, NBA teams.

By J. BRADY McCOLLOUGH
The Kansas City Star

OKLAHOMA CITY | All day, the middle-aged men sat at the front of the Texas cheering section, wearing burnt-orange sweater vests over white shirts with blue jeans and cowboy boots.

The Texas "Barnes Stormers," named for Longhorns coach Rick Barnes, have four uniforms, one for each day of the Big 12 tournament. Today, they plan on wearing something a little more risky.

"It's what we call our really high-quality silky Longhorn shirt," says Glenn West, the organizer of the 20-person group. "It has Texas buttons on it. It's really pretty slick."

Adds fellow member Bob Lander, "Very metrosexual."

Hmmm. Is this a sign that 50-something-year-old Texans are feeling more liberated these days? Or is it a sign that the modern Texan will do anything -- anything -- for his basketball team? Decide for yourself, but one thing is for sure in March of 2007: The days of Texans treating basketball as something to pass the time until spring practice starts are long gone.

You could make a case that there is no better basketball being played anywhere than in the state of Texas. In the NBA, the Dallas Mavericks have the best record in the league, 51-9. Throw in the San Antonio Spurs and the Houston Rockets, and the Texas NBA triangle is winning 72 percent of its games.

In college hoops, no state can match Texas' star power. Texas freshman phenom Kevin Durant is the Big 12 Player of the Year and, barring an upset, will sweep the National Player of the Year Award circuit. The crazy thing is that there are some who believe Texas A&M guard Acie Law should have won the Big 12's honor for leading the resurrection of Aggie basketball. And, of course, legendary coach Bobby Knight roams the sideline on the plains for Texas Tech.

It's no wonder Texans are willing to mix it up a bit in regard to their attire.

"The interest in basketball in the state has risen," says Fran Fraschilla, an ESPN color analyst for Big 12 basketball who lives in Dallas. "And while it will never overtake football, there's definitely more interest in the game of basketball from the NBA all the way down to the grade-school level than there's probably ever been."

***

There was certainly an unmistakable twang to this day of quarterfinal action. The Texas Tech fans shot their imaginary guns, the Aggie "yell leaders" tried to ignite a sterile arena and the Barnes Stormers led cheers of "Texas! Fight!" Even Baylor fans got a chance to enjoy their state's prosperity for an extra day.

But how did this happen? The Texas schools were supposed to own football, and that was it. Well, first, the Big 12 happened. The Texas schools' basketball programs couldn't compete nationally in the Southwest Conference, so they slowly became irrelevant. The Big 12 allowed Texas coaches to say to recruits, "Come here, and you can play in Allen Fieldhouse."

Fraschilla points to the improvement of high-school basketball in Texas. He says there was always talent in Texas' big cities, but the players are more polished because the state lifted restrictions that prohibited high-school coaches from coaching their players during the summers. Another problem was that the college-ready players the state did produce weren't sticking around.

In 2006, 12 of the top 100 high-school players in the country according to Rivals.com were from Texas. Three of those players -- D.J. Augustin, Damion James and Justin Mason -- signed with the Longhorns. Donald Sloan and Bryan Davis signed with Texas A&M. Aggies coach Billy Gillispie has put together an all-Texas team except for two foreign players.

"Basketball in Texas has always been good," says John Thornton, a former Texas A&M player, now the school's senior associate athletic director. "What happened is all the players have gone out of state. What you're seeing is people appreciating what's happening in the state, and they're staying home."

While Gillespie has focused on in-state recruiting, Barnes has tried to extend his program nationally. Durant chose Texas over perennial powers and recent national champions Connecticut and North Carolina.

"Now what does that tell you?" Lander says, proudly.

***

Don't get us wrong, now. Texans still love their pigskin. They're still learning how to be basketball fans -- especially those Aggies. Remember, only three years ago, Texas A&M finished the Big 12 season 0-16.

"I drove to five home games during the 0-16 season," says extremely loyal Aggie basketball fan Ed Richards, who made the drive from his home in Lubbock. "I think me and about 20 other people were at the games."

That's how much Gillispie has done in his short time in College Station. With Law's help, Gillispie has enlivened a moribund fan base. But, they are still learning. Now, they struggle with how to handle losses like Friday's 57-56 loss to Oklahoma State.

"Aggie fans are so used to football where one game means a whole lot," Richards says. "As Aggie basketball fans, we have to realize it's a 34 to 35 game season."

In other words, they have to learn to step off the ledge.

It appears as if the Aggies aren't done playing 35-game seasons anytime soon. Richards, an alumni donor, has this bit of information for anyone who thinks Texas A&M is a fluke.

"I can speak for the Aggies," Richards says. "We are in the middle of a large campaign drive to expand our basketball complex. A lot of us loyal donors are as committed to basketball as we are to football."

Uh-oh. And it doesn't stop in College Station. They're not done purging the country's best talent in Austin either. On Friday morning, Barnes had breakfast with the Barnes Stormers, who have traveled to every Big 12 tournament. He brought good news.

"Rick Barnes told us this morning," Lander says, "that, because of Kevin, we're getting calls from all over the country that we would have never gotten before."

Now that's something worth dressing up over.

To reach J. Brady McCollough, sports reporter for The Star, call (816) 234-4363 or send e-mail to jmccollough@kcstar.com

J. Brady McCollough - jbrady@coveringsports.com (email) - 816-868-2621 (cell)