Once again, the Texas Longhorns are starting over.
Coach Rick Barnes didn't exactly plan it this way, but that's how it goes after all five starters from last season were either picked in the NBA draft or ran out of eligibility.
That attrition leaves Barnes with a roster of nine recruited scholarship players - six of them newcomers - led by enigmatic junior scoring guard J'Covan Brown. Texas technically has 11 scholarship players but two of them are long-time walk-ons who were rewarded this season for their loyalty and dedication.
Yet Barnes still expects the Longhorns to compete for the Big 12 championship in the first year the slimmed down league will play a true round-robin schedule in which teams play every opponent twice. Texas will be trying to get to the NCAA tournament for the 14th consecutive season under Barnes.
''We're not ever going to lower the bar here. Our expectations will still be at the highest level,'' Barnes said.
And why shouldn't they be? Last season, Texas started unranked after losing four starters and rose all the way to No. 3. Barnes compares this season to 2006-07 when Texas started four freshmen and went 25-10. Of course one of those freshmen was Kevin Durant, who won national player of the year honors that season.
''We don't ever have a Kevin Durant in this class. You only have one Kevin Durant,'' Barnes said. ''But we've been here before. I don't know that we've ever had a player sit down and say ''I'm one and done.' We've just been in a situation where we recruit really good players.''
Brown will be counted on to be one of the leaders for the Longhorns this season, a tenuous role given his past. A gifted offensive player who sometimes dazzles, Brown can take over games for long stretches but also has drawn attention for his visible frustration when Barnes pulls him off the court.
For Texas to jell this season, the Barnes-Brown relationship must thrive.
Brown said Barnes already has talked to him about being a team leader and that he'll need to keep his emotions in check as opponents game plan to stop him.
''Coach has told me to be the home run hitter,'' Brown said. ''Teams will game plan for me, but they won't take away from me being a good teammate.''
There have been questions about that in the past.
Last season, after he was pulled from a win over Oklahoma, profane Twitter posts were filed under Brown's account. Brown blamed an unnamed cousin for the posts, apologized to his teammates and the account was deactivated.
While Brown appears to feed off his emotions on the court, Barnes called him a ''very cerebral player.''
''I think he's grown,'' Barnes said. ''He's a smart kid with a tremendous IQ. ... He is all about winning.''
Teaming with Brown in the Texas backcourt will be freshman point guard Myck (pronounced Mike) Kabongo, one of the top-ranked recruits in the country out of Findley Prep in Henderson, Nev.
Kabongo said the lineup looked quite different when he committed to Texas, but he wasn't surprised when Jordan Hamilton, Tristan Thompson and Cody Johnson all left school early for the NBA.
''When guys work hard and put themselves in position to be in the NBA, that's what happens,'' Kabongo said. ''I kind of knew in the back of my mind a couple of guys wouldn't be here.''
Texas will be heavy at guard. Among the six freshmen, four are guards. Forwards Jonathan Holmes and Jaylen Bond will join seniors Clint Chapman and Alexis Wangmene in the frontcourt. Chapman redshirted last season and Wangmene averaged 2.3 points in 34 games.
Young teams often struggle with the physical nature of the Big 12, where muscular forwards and guards pound on opponents every night. Brown said Texas' freshmen will be ready for it.
''Some teams think young guys can't come in and bring toughness,'' Brown said. ''We'll have everything, the mental toughness, the hard-nosed toughness to on defense and offense.''
Barnes expects growing pains, especially on defense, where freshmen seldom understand the intensity Barnes demands of his players.
''Our older guys understand it,'' Barnes said. ''(The freshmen) are going to find out that it's a whole lot different than they realize ... But we're going to be good at something, even if it starts on defense.''
Texas opens the season Nov. 13 at home against Boston with key nonconference games at UCLA and North Carolina in December before the start of the Big 12 schedule.
