The Tennessee Volunteers are set to hire Rick Barnes as head coach of their basketball team following his departure from the Texas Longhorns and that came after Barnes previously took Texas to the NCAA Tournament in all but one of the last 17 seasons.
According to ESPN.com, the team offered Barnes the job soon after he parted ways with Texas and the deal was reportedly close to happening on Monday night. ESPN reports that the school will hold a press conference on Tuesday announcing the news that Barnes is taking the head coach position. Barnes previously won over 600 games while coaching at Texas, George Mason, Providence and Clemson.
Tennessee has been up and down over the past few years, as they had to fire Bruce Pearl and also dealt with some NCAA issues. Texas athletic director opted to fire Barnes as the head basketball coach despite Barnes making it to the NCAA Tournament in 16 seasons. Barnes revealed that Patterson wanted him to fire all his coaches or "be fired himself" and Barnes did not want to do that.
There were leaks about the news before a decision was reached and Barnes said that he was "shocked" about what happened. Texas lost to Butler in the second round of the NCAA Tournament and they came into the tourney as a number 11 seed.