I don’t keep in touch with every coach I’ve covered as a reporter. But I try to keep up with a lot of them.
With basketball season tipping off this week, I reached out to a few, as I normally do, asking how they’ve been, how they’re feeling about their teams, telling them good luck this season, etc.
One of the people I texted with was Texas State men’s basketball head coach Terrence “T.J.” Johnson. He told me there’s a lot of good energy floating around San Marcos, Texas, right now — the Bobcats’ football team is bowl-eligible for the first time since 2014 (there were some ROUGH seasons in between) and the volleyball team is at the top of its division (that’s normal for them). He told me his team’s got a ton of injuries to start the year off and he’s hoping they can “hold the rope” until those players return.
He asked me how I’ve liked the Missouri beat so far. I told him how much I’ve been enjoying it and how well everything’s gone.
“I love those guys out there,” T.J. told me. “C.Y. (Charlton Young) and (Dennis) Gates are elite people and coaches.”
I explained what Mizzou is up against this year, having to make up for Kobe Brown and trying to do it by committee rather than finding a one-to-one replacement.
“It’s reminding me a lot of the season after Nijal graduated,” I told him. Here’s why.
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