Loss doesn't dim hopes
UH’s national prominence sees ESPN College GameDay hosted at Fertitta Center
Mar 4, 2019, 8:35 am
Jackson T. Gatlin/SportsMap
The excitement in the air was palpable as fans stormed the Fertitta Center doors for the first-come, first-seating to take part in ESPN College GameDay at the University of Houston this past Saturday.
Free basketball net hats, hilarious handmade signs and a sea of red dawned the stands as the GameDay broadcast hit the airwaves at 10 a.m.
Fans of all shapes and sizes, including the newly-famous "Trash Can Man" were joined together to celebrate the University of Houston men's basketball program and its rise to national relevancy; relevancy that has not been seen since the days when Hakeem Olajuwon and Clyde Drexler were walking around as students and Phi Slama Jama was dominating opposing teams on the hardwood.
But can head coach Kelvin Sampson and his squad finish off the historic run with a national title?
"They're absolutely good enough," said ESPN's Jay Bilas. "Kelvin Sampson's done a remarkable job resurrecting this program. He's built it on taking care of the ball, on defense and on rebounding. That's the identity of this team. They're legit and they can get to the Final Four."
The GameDay crew proceeded to discuss tournament seeding, and upon bringing up Duke as the (likely) No. 1 seed, the raucous Cougar crowd began to chant "overrated" and "we want Duke" behind them.
While there are plenty of successful programs across America, Duke being one of them, Houston and coach Sampson's recipe for success boils down to one thing: family.
"Most important thing to me is my faith and family," Sampson said. "I don't think I was great at those early on. Coming here was a chance to get the family together. That's why this is the best job I've ever had."
From benching senior Corey Davis Jr. in the first half of a game earlier this year because he was late to the bus or showing support for redshirt sophomore DeJon Jarreau after a death in his family, Coach Sampson has developed a culture of family-first values and accountability at the University of Houston.
He even invites players to his house the night before a game to enjoy fresh baked chocolate chip cookies made by his wife Karen, a ritual they have all come to enjoy.
"He's teaching them history, and that's why they have such a strong foundation," said Cougar basketball alumnus and former Houston Rocket Elvin Hayes. "We got to the final four; they can maybe get to the championship."
Hayes was not the only alumnus and ex-Rocket in "Coogs" house Saturday, as Olajuwon also joined the show to provide his insight on coach Sampson and the UH basketball program.
"Coach Sampson has done a fantastic job gaining national attention. He's tough and demanding. I think they wouldn't have been able to find anyone better to turn this program around," Olajuwon said.
Despite recording just its second loss of the season against the UCF Knights later that afternoon, the Cougars have nothing to be ashamed of.
A few fans trickled out early when it became clear UCF was destined to win, but the majority of them stayed and applauded, still proud of their now 27-2 ball club.
Backed by legends, analysts and billionaire Tilman Fertitta, whose name hangs off the sides of the building, Cougar nation could not have asked for a better leader of a basketball Renaissance than Kelvin Sampson.
It’s been an excellent weeklong stretch of games for the Astros tempered by the news of yet another season-ending injury to a starting pitcher. To get the bad news out of the way, it comes as no surprise that Ronel Blanco needs Tommy John surgery and is done until at least the middle of next season. While Blanco had not been nearly as good through nine 2025 starts as he was last season, he was still taking his regular return and on average getting into the sixth inning. Blanco turns 32 years old at the end of August. He’s not even salary arbitration-eligible until 2027. That last fact may be good news for him. The Astros will likely keep Blanco next year in hopes he can contribute in the second half of the season, since they will pay him barely the Major League minimum salary ($780,000 next year) That’s in contrast to Jose Urquidy, who in the midst of his salary arbitration years would have cost about three and a half million dollars to keep, so the Astros non-tendered him.
With Blanco joining Hayden Wesneski in the “See you next year! Hopefully.” club, it struck me as interesting that the Astros let Lance McCullers throw 102 pitches in his Wednesday outing vs. the Athletics. That’s eleven more than he had thrown in any of his prior four starts. McCullers holding up physically would be a huge boost, but the new essentials in the Astros’ rotation are Framber Valdez and Hunter Brown. Framber has settled in to the tune of a 1.93 earned run average over his last four starts. Brown’s season ERA is 2.00. Brown has had five days of rest before all eleven of his starts this season. This Sunday is Brown’s presently next scheduled outing. He would work on four days of rest if on the mound Sunday against the Rays.
Taking the last two games from the Mariners was huge (for the second half of May anyway). Keeping the good times rolling by sweeping the two-game miniseries from the A’s was less significant but still nice. Maybe not quite nice enough to have Frank “The Tank” from the movie Old School belting out “We’re going streaking!!!” but it did give the Astros their first four game winning streak of the season. They still have not lost more than three straight.
On a heater!
Speaking of streaking, time for annual mention of one of my all-time favorite baseball factoids. The 1916 New York Giants hold the MLB record for the longest win streak with an incredible 26 in a row. Earlier in the season the Giants ripped off 17 in a row. Combine the two streaks and that’s 43-0! The 1916 New York Giants finished in fourth place. In all their other games the Giants went 43-66. The American League’s longest ever winning streak is of fairly recent vintage. The 2007 Cleveland Indians won 22 straight. There have been only two other winning streaks since 1900 of at least 20 games. The 1935 Chicago Cubs won 21 straight. The Art Howe-managed 2002 Oakland A’s won 20 in a row, and were the inspiration for the movie Moneyball. The Astros have three 12 game winning streaks as the longest in their history.
Expect the unexpected
Tuesday’s win over the A’s brought the Astros to the one-third completed point of the regular season. Isaac Paredes was definitely their best offensive player to that milepost. His “on pace for” numbers were the best on the ballclub 33 home runs and 93 runs batted in. Paredes also led in runs scored with 29. The last Astro to lead the team in all three of those categories was Alex Bregman who did it in both 2018 and 2019. That Bregman was clearly a better player than this Paredes, but Isaac healthy and making “only” 6.625 million dollars this season is a heck of a lot better value than Bregman at 40 mil for the Red Sox, especially given that while Bregman was off to a sensational start for Boston, he’s now out for at least a month with a quad injury.
Hunter Brown is on pace to win 20 games. The last Astro to get there was Gerrit Cole on the last day of the 2019 regular season. The day before that Justin Verlander won his 21st game.
The Cleveland Guardians’ bullpen was awesome last season, by far the best in the league with four relievers who each pitched in at least 74 games posting ERAs of 1.92 or lower, headlined by closer Emmanuel Clase’s microscopic 0.61. One-third of the way through this season for the Astros: Bryan Abreu sat at 1.90, Steven Okert 1.82, Josh Hader 1.57, Bryan King 1.52.
For Astro-centric conversation, join Brandon Strange, Josh Jordan, and me for the Stone Cold ‘Stros podcast which drops each Monday afternoon, with an additional episode now on Thursday. Click here to catch!
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