Texas Tech's bright future makes Elite Eight collapse easier to stomach

Texas Tech basketball fans have now had time to sleep on Saturday night's 84-79 come-from-ahead loss to No. 1 seed Florida in the Elite Eight. As they say, time heals all wounds, and that process of healing and moving on now begins in earnest. Fortunately, the future of this program is bright enough to make the pain of how the 2024-25 season ended easier to swallow.

Early Sunday morning, around 2:30 a.m., dozens of Red Raider fans showed up at the Texas Tech basketball practice facility in Lubbock to welcome head coach Grant McCasland and his team home from San Francisco. That doesn't happen unless there is a belief among the fan base that what transpired in the season finale was more of a stepping stone moment rather than a once-in-a-lifetime blown opportunity.

Certainly, there are brighter days ahead for the program, and now, given the resources that have been and will continue to be poured into Tech hoops, optimism rules the day in West Texas, even just hours after seeing the Red Raiders suffer one of the most gut-wrenching losses in the history of the school.

All the pieces are in place for Texas Tech to remain a national contender

Since the turn of the century, Texas Tech has reached at least the second weekend of the NCAA Tournament five times. Fortunately, four of those appearances have come in the past seven seasons in which the tournament has been held.

Back in 2005, when the Red Raiders reached the Sweet 16 for the first time since 1996, only to lose to West Virginia, it felt like that was an anomalous situation, a mere blip on the radar for the program. Head coach Bob Knight was obviously near the end of his career, and the unlikelihood of that particular team getting to the second weekend of the tournament left most people in Raiderland feeling like a huge opportunity to do something special had been lost.

That proved to be the case as Tech would not win an NCAA Tournament game again until 2018.

Since then, though, this program has made a habit of playing deep into March. Therefore, the attitude of Texas Tech basketball fans has shifted. No longer is there an acceptance of mediocrity, but rather, there is an expectation that Elite Eights and Final Fours are going to be part of the fabric of the program.

What's more, everyone is confident that head coach McCasland is the perfect man to lead Tech to new heights. That's because he is the perfect fit for West Texas and Lubbock, and he appears more than happy to call Texas Tech home for the long haul. It isn't wrong to think that he could eventually come to be for Tech what his mentor, Scott Drew, has become for Baylor basketball.

After all, McCasland has won at every level of the sport. Including his JUCO coaching days, his career winning percentage as a head coach is .741. What's more, at the Division-I level, he's gone 206-97 (.679). That is a sparkling record considering that seven of the nine seasons he's spent in Division I have been at Arkansas State or North Texas, two schools not known as basketball powers.

In other words, McCasland is a proven winner, and there is no reason to expect that to change anytime soon. Plus, he could have the foundation in place to get back to the Elite Eight very soon.

Next season, Tech could conceivably be one of the favorites in the Big 12. Of course, the era of player movement due to the transfer portal and N.I.L. payments has made it impossible to predict what any team's roster will look like from season to season. However, Texas Tech could bring back a core of players who could form the foundation of an elite team in 2025-26.

Star forward Darrion Williams, who was Tech's best player in the NCAA Tournament, has another year of eligibility left and most expect him to receive a healthy N.I.L. deal to remain in Lubbock (especially given that his game doesn't seem like it is made for the NBA).

Meanwhile, Big 12 Player of the Year, JT Toppin, Tech's leading scorer this season, has two years of eligibility remaining. Though he will likely test the NBA waters this offseason, it isn't crazy to envision him returning to school next year as well, especially if he gets an N.I.L. offer that is comparable to or higher than what he might earn as a late-first-round or second-round NBA Draft pick.

Of course, everyone is amped to see what freshman guard Christian Anderson could eventually become. This year, he far exceeded expectations, and now, he's going to be viewed as the centerpiece of Tech's backcourt, especially with Chance McMillian and Elijah Hawkins out of eligibility.

If those three players all return along with Kevin Overton and Federiko Federiko (the latter of whom may apply for an extra year of eligibility given that he began his career in the JUCO ranks), the Red Raiders will have the makings of a top-flight Big 12 team next season. Then, when the program adds to that core with some top-end transfers, as expected, Tech could return an even stronger roster next season than the one that came within an eyelash of the Final Four this season.

That's why Texas Tech fans can deal with the loss to Florida, as disappointing as it may have been. This is a new era of Texas Tech basketball, and now, it isn't crazy to think about deep March runs as commonplace rather than as once-in-a-generation occurrences.

While missing out on playing in the Final Four in San Antonio will always nag at Red Raiders everywhere, it won't be as decimating as it could have been because this program is just scratching the surface of what it might become in the McCasland era.