KANSAS CITY, Mo. — During his press conference at the Big 12 Men’s Basketball Tipoff on Wednesday, Houston coach Kelvin Sampson shared an interesting factoid.
Since he took over at Houston ahead of the 2014-15 season, he has really only had three point guards. First there was Galen Robinson. Then came DeJon Jarreau. Jamal Shead, whom Sampson described as “just a high-level point guard,” has quarterbacked the UH offense since the 2021-22 season.
A native of Manor, Shead considered chasing a professional career this offseason. But he announced in May that he had withdrawn his name from the NBA draft pool and would return to Houston. At the time, Shead told the followers on his social media platforms that, “When writing your story, don’t let anyone else hold the pen. … This chapter has pages left to be written.”
Expanding on those words, Shead said that “I have it tatted on me ‘success requires patience.’ Me and my family were just talking, it just wasn’t my time yet. I have a better opportunity to perform at a higher level this year on a bigger stage and try to put my name out there a little bit more. I came back for this team and also it just wasn’t my time.”
Last season, the 6-foot11 Shead became just the second Cougar to distribute 200 assists in two different seasons. His 460 assists rank seventh among the all-time Cougars, and another 200-assist season will move him into the top-three on that career chart at UH.
Only 13 Cougars have recorded more steals in their college careers than Shead, who has 146. He likely won’t break Clyde Drexler’s school record of 268, but he can boast that he’s done better in that statistical category than Hakeem Olajuwon (100).
As a team, Shead said that Houston doesn’t like to look ahead too much. The only goal for the Cougars is a conference championship and UH was picked second in the Big 12’s preseason poll. Individually, however, Shead admits that he has began to think about his legacy at Houston.
“You think about your legacy because that’s how you’re remembered,” Shead said. “I’ve tried to do as much memorable stuff as I can before it’s my time to leave this school. I want my mark on this school in the right way and I’m headed in the right direction.”
Oklahoma assistant coach Rodney Terry?
Sampson told reporters that while he was at Oklahoma, he once tried to hire UT coach Rodney Terry as an assistant. Sampson then retorted that “Rick Barnes snookered me again. Rick has always done that to me for some reason.”
Terry later said that Sampson had misremembered why he turned down the Sooners, but confirmed the gist of the story. Terry said that Sampson made him a good offer ahead of the 2002-03 season, but he ultimately decided to join Jerry Wainwright’s staff at Richmond as an associate head coach. A little while later, Barnes offered Terry a job at Texas and he spent the next nine seasons with the Longhorns.
Years later, there are no hard feelings. Sampson referred to Terry as a friend on Wednesday. Terry said that “Coach has always been a class guy. I’ve got a lot of respect for Coach.”
Fill in the blank: What is __ Basketball?
On Wednesday, teams from BYU, Central Florida, Cincinnati and Houston introduced themselves to the Big 12 media corps. Those four schools are joining the conference this season.
Not everyone in the Big 12 is familiar with these newcomers. So coaches and players from each school were asked to describe their calling cards: What is “BYU Basketball?” What is “Cincinnati Basketball?” What is “Houston Basketball?” What is “UCF Basketball?”
BYU guard Spencer Johnson: “We are together. We’re confident. We’re resilient. And we’re gonna shoot the lights out of the ball.”
Cincinnati wing John Newman III: “Our brand of basketball is we want to play the full 40 (minutes), we want to play blue-collar, play tough, play hard every single play and just play together. If we do that, the talent will show. Like, the talent speaks for itself. It’s all there. I think it’s just about everything else for us.”
Houston guard L.J. Cryer: “It’s a hard-nosed brand of basketball. You’re going to see a bunch of rebounding, a bunch of diving on the floor, just locking in, locking down every possession and fast-paced basketball. Everything we do, we do it hard.”
UCF coach Johnny Dawkins: “Our calling card is we’re going to defend and we’re going to rebound. I think it starts there. If we’re going to have any success in any league, especially this league, we’re going to have to be a really good defensive team and a team that understands the importance of rebounding the basketball.”
A good omen?
Thanks to Taylor Swift, BYU coach Mark Pope isn’t that concerned about a Big 12 preseason poll in which BYU was picked to finish 13th. BYU received 29 points in a polling of the conference’s head coaches. Only Central Florida, which compiled 14 points, was lower.
Pope, though, has four daughters who are fans of the aforementioned pop icon. He told reporters that, “We managed to make it to a couple of the Taylor Swift concerts this year and her favorite number is 13. I think that bodes well for BYU basketball this season.”
In all seriousness, BYU is coming off a season in which it went 19-15 and finished in a fifth-place tie in the West Coast Conference. The Cougars have made one appearance in the NCAA Tournament since 2016.
“We’re coming in here to compete and grow into winning and we’re really excited to do that,” Pope said. “I don’t know if anybody puts a lot of stock in the preseason picks. We’re excited to come compete.”
Baylor ready to open new arena
Over the two days the Big 12 was in Kansas City, both of Baylor’s basketball coaches got a chance to talk about the new arena that the Bears will open this winter. Baylor will start its upcoming seasons in the Ferrell Center, which has been its home since 1988. But the teams will move to the Foster Pavilion soon, and men’s coach Scott Drew shared that the first game is set to be played on Jan. 2.
Drew joked that reporters will enjoy better Wi-fi at the new arena. Drew also felt the Bears will enjoy a homecourt advantage within their new cozy confines.
“One of the best things that I think the state of Texas in general has done is made newer, smaller arenas to make sure the fans were more on top of you instead of so spread out with the bigger arenas that we used to have. So we should have the same thing, fans on top you, making sure they’re supporting the home team and welcoming the visiting team.”
Nicki Collen, who is entering her third season as the head coach of the Baylor women’s team, shared those sentiments on Tuesday. Baylor has gone 26-8 under Collen at the Ferrell Center, which can seat more than 10,000 fans. The Foster Pavilion will have a listed capacity of 7,000.
“When we came down and played at Moody (Center) last year, it’s obviously an unbelievable venue technologically and in pretty much every way, but we’re excited about the intimate size of Foster and at the same time, all the bells and whistles that it will have,” Collen said. “We’re excited about how that (arena) connects downtown and how that can change the downtown scene as well and get people excited about Baylor basketball in general, men’s and women’s.”
The Texas women have scheduled a visit to the Foster Pavilion for Feb. 1. The men will head to Waco on March 4.
This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Manor product Jamal Shead returns as Houston basketball’s point guard
