Memphis Grizzlies: 5 College Coaches To Interview For Head Coaching Job
By Chris Kern
Chris Beard
Chris Beard has completely turned this Texas Tech program around in a short period of time. This was just his third season with the team, but he was still able to get them to the national championship game despite not having many top prospects.
One of his biggest accomplishments may be the development of Jarrett Culver. He was a good role player in year one, but now after he was the star of the team he has a good chance to be a top 5 pick in the 2019 NBA Draft.
The passion of which he coaches has rubbed off onto his players. He has turned this team into an elite defensive squad the past two seasons, but this year they improved on the offensive side of the ball while continuing their defensive improvements.
They lost six of their top eight leading scorers from the 2017-18 team that advanced to the Elite Eight and he was still able to make this year’s squad better. A big part of that was the additions of two graduate transfers in Matt Mooney and Tariq Owens.
Being able to succeed with roster turnover is a big part of success in the NBA, but he would also be given the chance to build with a good core group of players. He has shown he is able to mix and match guys to fit into what that season’s team is trying to do, but he personally would benefit from being able to coach the same group for a long time.
His journey to become the head coach at Texas Tech has been an exciting one. He has spent some time as a head coach in different leagues/levels such as Fort Scott Community College while also being the coach of the South Carolina Warriors in the ABA.
His previous division one stop(s) were Arkansas Little Rock, where he coached the 2015-16 season at and he led them to an NCAA Tournament win. He was also technically the coach at UNLV for a couple of weeks following that tournament run, but he never coached a game for them since the Texas Tech job opened up shortly after he was hired at UNLV and he took it in large part to be closer to home.
He has risen up the coaching ranks quickly and the next step would be to a blue blood program at the collegiate level, or maybe he would consider a jump to the NBA. It seems very unlikely he would consider this, but it’s worth a shot. Don’t be shocked if he receives serious NBA coaching consideration in the next year or two.