Chris Beard to Texas
Two big coaching announcements on April 1?? Hmm...
It is so hard to tell if news today is real. Obviously a move like this would make sense.
While Texas has money to spare, his buyout decreased today.
It's hard most days to tell if news is real. It's just that today you expect people to try and fool you.
TEXAS IS BACK!!!
AGAIN, AGAIN!!
How do they return to a place they have never been?
Lubbock to Austin is a 6 hour drive. Not sure why I needed to state this fact, except that Texas is a big state.
But Ann Arbor to Houghton is 8 hours.
Monroe to Copper Harbor is 10hrs.
In further "Texas is a big state" facts:
Beaumont, Texas is closer to Jacksonville, FL than it is to El Paso, Texas.
El Paso, Texas is closer to San Diego, CA than it is to Beaumont, Texas.
Having driven between Austin/San Antonio and San Diego/LA, that stretch off I-10 between San Antonio and El Paso is the most soul-crushing drive ever. I’ve driven everywhere, but that 6-7 hours is just soberingly terrible.
Nebraska says "Hold my beer."
Indiana and Ilinois are pretty bad too. Iowa I find surprisingly nice.
Iowa has rolling, verdant hills. It's like Ireland, just with corn instead of potatoes.
Once you get west of Lincoln, Nebraska is perdition.
Recently had to drive the entire state of Ohio from West Virginia to Toledo (right through Columbus). Just brutal. Most of the roads are 60 mph and even at that those people drive slow. It seemed to take forever. As soon as we hit the Michigan line everyone was going 85.
Driving in Ohio is the absolute worst. 60 mph and people are glued to the left lane for no apparent reason. Could be nobody in the right lane for miles and someone will still sit in the left lane and not move over.
I promise you that isn't just Ohio. That is a very, very American phenomenon.
Yeah, West Texas I-10 has long distances between places, but I've personally never hated it. At least it is generally wide open and you can see a LONG way out into the distance.
My least favorite long-distance drives are personally in the Southeast, where the interstate goes on for hundreds of miles with nothing but pine trees as the scenery. Something like I-65 in southern Alabama, I-85 in Virginia or I-64 east of Charlottesville (x Richmond).
I took a vacation in Texas 20+ years ago and drove from Dallas to San Antonio to Austin to Corpus Christie, to a couple of other places. the weird thing about it was that the sky really was bigger in Texas. I couldn't explain it, but the sky was actually bigger. I've driven cross country through Nebraska, Wyoming, Iowa, North Dakota, etc., so it wasn't that I hadn't been in wide-open places.
Of course we were smoking quite a bit on the trip...
Fort Myers to Tallahassee is as miserable as any 6 hours. Florida is a big box of kitty litter with a few palm trees inserted sporadically. I preferred flying to visit my daughter at Kettering in Flint as opposed to driving within Florida to visit my daughter at FSU when they were doing simultaneous undergrad work.
I am eagerly looking forward to totally autonomous cars so I can work while driving. Or maybe drink while driving. I'll settle for either.
I don’t know what you do for a living, but try writing a travel book you are a natural.
Most people have never driven it, but I-8 between Casa Grande, AZ and Yuma, AZ is literally nothing.
I've done that I-10 drive and it's rough, but there are some towns with a semblance of population running around.
That, sir, is an interesting piece of knowledge. You have blown my mind.
Alaska says "hello"
Truth
Dog sled travel is a whole different story.
I'm sure this will help the *already strong* camaraderie within the Big 12 - especially the love for Texas by it's conference brethren.
I hope he's successful for his sake. Or else Texas is going to shit all over that man.
Some people enjoy being shit on.
Whoa. That is a complete home run hire. Hard to think any team will make out better in the carousel this year.
Not a surprise, but I think Chris Beard would not leave Texas Tech for anywhere else. He is a UT-Austin alum after all.
Does anyone in Texas actually call it UT-Austin? Isn't that a bit like saying UM-Ann Arbor?
They do; I think they say UT-Austin because otherwise it might be confused for Tennessee.
I've always assumed people from Austin like to be seen as unique and special, so they always mention Austin when they can just to make sure you know.
The other branches of the UT system are also a bit stronger and larger than the outlying UM branches, so they do say UT - Austin. All the high school wannabe engineers down here call Michigan "UMich", and people wishing the team well tell me "Go Big Blue!". It's all good.
To be fair our web address is umich.edu.
But "Go Big Blue" is unpardonable.
I dont understand why some of our fans get so butthurt about being called big blue
In general, no, but there are other UT's in the state: Dallas, San Antonio, El Paso, Arlington, etc. There are times you would use it for clarification purposes.
Lived in Austin for a few years - went to Texas A&M - lived in Texas for a little over a decade. Most folk just use Texas colloquially and everyone understands which school they mean. On broadcasts they would include Austin but can’t think of anyone doing that in normal conversation.
A&M also has several satellite schools but nobody says A&M-College Station.
Went to grad school at UW-Madison and it’s way more common in Wisconsin to include the city in the name for the UW schools.
As an aside I’ve been absolutely delighted to see the Aggies outshine the Longhorns in football lately. When we jumped to the SEC it caused serious UT butt ache and they cancelled the annual thanksgiving game purely out of spite and “because they could”. So great to see them floundering ever since. I took sick pleasure listening to hosts of the AM sports shows in Austin whine endlessly while I lived there.
Cheers.
So all Texas colleges do, indeed, form the feeder system to UT... Good to know, for when I next meet a Texas Tech fan.
Austin is also Paris compared to Lubbock.
Isn’t Gary, Indiana Paris compared to Lubbock? I’ve never been but I hear things
I went to h.s. in TX; my favorite teacher was a TT grad. She referred to the place as "Lubbuttocks."
As a UNLV fan too, fuck Chris Beard. Glad this happened to Texas Tech, karma. & no, I'm not bitter at all.
Joining his brother Frank.....
ZZ Top
Such a great gimmick, only guy without a beard.
Beard is a good hire for Texas and should make them a major contender in the Big 12.
I find this odd. It's a good higher, but it's the equivalent of Michigan hiring Mel Tucker from State as rivalries go.