On March 25, the Texas Longhorns introduced head coach Sean Miller as the 27th head basketball coach in the program’s history, hoping that Miller’s experience leading the Xavier Musketeers and Arizona Wildcats will translate into success on the Forty Acres after the program has spent the last decade trying to replace Rick Barnes, the most successful head coach in its history.
In Miller’s first season, he’ll surpass 500 career wins after making two Sweet 16 appearances and one Elite Eight appearance in his
two stints at Xavier sandwiched around his career-defining run in Tucson, when Miller made three Elite Eights and two Sweet 16s in a seven-year stretch at Arizona.
“Our new coach has proven he can build winning programs. He develops great players and is a brilliant basketball tactician. Anyone who has watched his previous teams has seen that they were extremely well coached. They won at the highest level, they made deep runs in the NCAA tournament, and they play an exciting brand of basketball,” Texas Board of Regents chairman Kevin Eltife said at Miller’s introduction.
Miller’s evaluation as a coach includes a greater emphasis on playing with pace offensively after taking a more deliberate, defensive-minded approach earlier in his career.
“When you look at college basketball and player development being exciting, you can play fast and you can also play smart, but I will tell you that in terms of pace of play and tempo, I promise I will deliver on not only an exciting style, but I think a style that people and players will love to watch in person, on TV, and most importantly, to be a part of,” Miller said.
That includes ball and player movement on offense in addition the requisite toughness demanded by the rugged style of play in the SEC.
The process of Miller establishing his style of play for the 2025-26 season was inhibited by guard Tramon Mark and forward Lassina Traore not receiving full clearance to practice until late August, the late arrivals of two European signees, forward Declan Duru and center Lewis Obiorah, and injuries sustained by Traore and center Matas Vokietaitis that sidelined them for most of preseason practice.
“When you have two players, especially, that both play the same position out for this extended period, that has not helped our progress offensively and, unfortunately, that’s just where we’re at,” Miller said.
“Time is not on our side when it comes to that,” he added.
Asked by Burnt Orange Nation about what Miller learned about his team during preseason, and in dealing with the injuries, the first-year head coach tried to set expectations for the non-conference schedule.
“We’re going to be a very difficult team to judge in the months of November and December in my best attempt, and I think all of our collective best attempt to be the best that we can be,” Miller said. “We have some limitations simply because we just haven’t been together and through experiences long enough — we just don’t have enough of those.”
It’s a common problem following coaching changes exacerbated by the particular circumstances of this team.
After the season opener against No. 6 Duke in Charlotte that Miller was adamant about not scheduling, Texas will benefit from a winnable bracket in the 2025 Maui Invitational and an ACC/SEC Challenge matchup against a Virginia program in transition after Tony Bennett’s abrupt retirement and the subsequent hire of Ryan Odom from VCU. A road trip to Storrs to face No. 4 UConn currently features a 23-percent win probability from BartTorvik.com.
Taken in whole and with consideration to Miller’s attempts to lower expectations, the Horns should still emerge from non-conference play without any resume-destructive losses unless things really implode, affording the possibility of a more holistic evaluation of the team heading into the crucible of SEC play.
“I think the silver lining when you watch our group, what I hope we bring to life for everybody, is we’re a team that continues to develop and get better as we go along, and that we hit our stride at the right time with continued good health and just constant work and improvement,” Miller said.
Even though that’s the trajectory that every coach hopes for in every sport, the combination of the coaching change and limited full-strength practice time is, once again, forcing it on this particular group.
“I think that the more we play games, the longer we are together, I believe that we’ll be a better team, a more competitive team, and a team that can win bigger games later in the year. That doesn’t mean we’re starting off with a bunch of excuses or don’t feel like we can do it, but I think you guys know what I mean when I say time isn’t on our side,” Miller said.
What the Longhorns head coach has tried to do with the time he’s had is maintain flexibility with his core strategies.
“What you find is each day, each week, especially each week, you learn a little bit more, some of which is, that’s not going to work, and then you pivot and you automatically go to what you now have realized is your better course. So you have to have some flexibility,” Miller said.
The skill sets of certain players look different to Miller now that he’s had the chance to coach them. Some combinations work more poorly than expected. It’s a process of adaptation and evolution that will continue into the non-conference schedule — Miller doesn’t want to call it experimentation, but it’s something close to it until the staff has “the answers to the test.”
Through that process, the focus will be on what the team can control, especially its effort, a non-negotiable for Miller that he believe will endear the team to the burnt orange and white faithful through the growing process of his tenure.
“What fans always respect is teams and players that play with great effort,” Miller said.
Not all effort is created equal, though — a lot of teams think that they play with great effort that may pale in comparison to a team like Houston that bases its identity around its fanatical effort.
“Like I said about everything here, time will allow us to be better, even in that area, but we have to play with tremendous effort that if you’re a Texas fan, you’re a basketball fan, that you learn to really respect and appreciate the effort level and the togetherness, but in particularly, I think the energy and the competitive spirit that we play with, that’s what we can control, that’s what we’re growing, and that’s what we’re building,” Miller said.
