In a change, UH relying on youthful rotation heading into March Madness after early growing pains

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Pick any game, and you’ve probably seen the many emotions and reactions of University of Houston coach Kelvin Sampson.

Maybe he will take a seat on the bench, with arms crossed, and shake his head.

“What are you doing?” is a favorite line.

“Think,” he says as he points a finger to his head.

If all else fails, yelling often works.

Then Sampson remembers this team is unlike any he’s had in a dozen seasons at Houston. Or anywhere, for that matter, in his 37-year Hall of Fame-worthy career.

“This is the first time where we’ve jumped off the deep end and just depended on freshmen — and we paid the price in a lot of games,” Sampson said. “But I understood it. You just have to accept it. Once you make the decision, you don’t get to second guess it.”

Maybe it’s a bad pass or turnover by freshman point guard Kingston Flemings.

Perhaps it’s a missed defensive assignment or lack of urgency to crash the boards by freshman forward Chris Cenac Jr.

“When you are dealing with multiple first-year guys, you’re going to have a lot of possessions where you just cross your eyes and go, ‘What did I just see? ’” Sampson said.

“They’ve done a good job of spreading it around. It’s never the same guy twice. Chris screws something up, OK, here comes Kingston. Kingston screws something up, here comes Isiah (Harwell) or here comes Chase (McCarty) or Mercy (Miller). We haven’t been in that situation where we had so many freshmen or first-year guys.”

Yet here the Cougars are: Still on the short list of national title contenders, the same physical and punishing style few teams want to play in the NCAA Tournament.

UH (28-6) is the No. 2 seed in the South Region and will open against No. 15 seed Idaho at 9:10 p.m. Thursday (truTV) in Oklahoma City. Two wins and the Cougars would advance to play in the Sweet 16 at Toyota Center, just two miles from campus.

Sampson, 70, called this season “probably our most challenging” with a roster that relied on two freshmen starters (Flemings and Cenac) and big contributions from redshirt freshman forward Chase McCarty and sophomore guard Mercy Miller down the stretch. UH paired the youth with Emanuel Sharp, Milos Uzan and Joseph Tugler, a returning core that was part of a team that fell short in last season’s national championship game.

There have been growing pains along the way, most notably UH’s longest losing streak since 2017, a three-game skid in February against Iowa State, Arizona and Kansas that ended a two-year reign as Big 12 champions.

“In so many ways, we were so spoiled with the group last year because they had already bumped their head,” said Kellen Sampson, UH’s assistant coach and head coach-in-waiting. “These guys are making the same mistakes that those guys made. We had just gone through that journey with them. It’s not their fault that they didn’t know. They shouldn’t know.”

In previous seasons, UH has dealt with roster turnover, having to replace players that graduated or left to begin pro careers. Their replacements were usually veterans signed through the transfer portal, allowing time to develop younger players. Before he became a three-year starter, consensus All-American and the Naismith Defensive Player of the Year, Jamal Shead sat on the bench as a freshman.

That wasn’t an option this year for Flemings and Cenac, part of the No. 2 signing class in the country that also included Harwell, a five-star guard who was slowed by his recovery from a knee injury to begin the season, and Bryce Jackson, a guard who is redshirting this season. It’s been a learn-on-the-go, baptism by fire as Flemings and Cenac were starters from the first game of the season.

During the Year of the Freshmen in college basketball, Flemings has been among the best. He became the first freshman to be named All-America in program history, was All-Big 12 first team and he’s on pace to lead the team in scoring (16.4).

At 6-foot-11, Cenac spent the regular season learning a new position, switching from exclusively in the post in his prep career to stepping more often on the perimeter. He has averaged nearly 10 points and a team-high 7.5 rebounds while also tied for fourth with 29 3-pointers.

While neither Flemings nor Cenac have revealed their intentions, both are widely expected to be one-and-done and declare for the NBA draft. Flemings is currently projected among the top six picks, a rapid climb for a freshman who was expected to be on campus for at least two seasons when he first arrived, and Cenac is just outside the top 14 lottery picks. Each of the first 10 picks are freshmen, according to the latest CBS Sports mock draft, among them four — AJ Dybantsa (BYU), Darryn Peterson (Kansas), Flemings and Brayden Burries (Arizona) — from the Big 12.

Kelvin Sampson said one word would need to be applied immediately.

“I knew I would have to be more patient, and I have,” he said.

He watched Flemings and Cenac adapt to the college game. How Flemings learned to play defense, rather than the “HYM Theory” style he played in high school.

“Hope you miss,” Sampson said. “That was about the extent of it.”

Sampson had to remind himself that Cenac had never played perimeter defense. Falling for shot fakes? He was bound to fall for them.

“That was like learning French for him,” Sampson said. “If you give Chris a decent eyebrow fake, well, there’s a good chance he’s going to jump out of the gym because he has no discipline,” Sampson said. “Nor should he. He’s never done it before. It’s like somebody learning a foreign language. It’s going to take a while. You may know the words, but you don’t know the sentences.”

Flemings and Cenac had their coming-out-party in mid-November, combining for 40 points and 14 rebounds (16-of-23 shooting) as the top-ranked Cougars beat No. 22 Auburn in Birmingham, Ala. In January, Flemings posted 20, 42 and 27 points in three straight games. His 42 points in a loss to Texas Tech were the most by a UH player in 18 years.

“Once the season started you could see their confidence grow and they continued to get better,” said Uzan, who has shared point guard duties with Flemings throughout the season.

Flemings said each game has offered a lesson. Some moments it’s when to anticipate a screen. When to box out. Limiting turnovers.

“When you are in a game, you’re still going to make mistakes,” said Flemings, who is averaging 31.7 minutes per game. “There’s a mistake probably on every play. There’s only so many perfect plays in a game. As the year has gone on, I’ve gotten much better, but obviously you can always get better.”

Cenac has posted 12 double-digit rebound games this season, including a combined 25 in losses to Iowa State and Arizona. At the Big 12 tournament, Cenac had one of his best overall games of the season with 17 points and 14 rebounds in the semifinal win against Kansas.

“I feel like I’ve learned something new every game,” said Cenac, who is averaging 24.7 minutes. “I’m looking forward to learning more.”

Both players said the chance to be challenged was one of the main reasons for signing with UH.

“Coming here, I knew Coach Sampson was going to push me,” Flemings said.

Much like the 2024-25 season, the Cougars had question marks, specifically on the defensive end, early in the season after leaving the Players Era Festival in Las Vegas.

“I can’t tell you how bad we were against Auburn, Tennessee, Notre Dame, Florida State and Syracuse,” Kelvin Sampson said. “I can’t quantify how bad we were in those games defensively versus where we are now. Which is why I don’t overreact to things in November. It was going to take them awhile to get better.”

By the time Big 12 play began, Kellen Sampson said the Cougars had made the type of progress that signaled the team was headed in the right direction.

“There was a time we were frustrated we weren’t coaching last year’s team still,” he said. “We turned a huge corner when we learned to really have fun doing this all over again with these guys. Every bump on the head, we know how to find the ice and fix it.”

Based on two freshmen starters and the Big 12’s status as the toughest league in college basketball, Kelvin Sampson would’ve had another reaction after his team won 28 games in the regular season and finished second.

“I would’ve said no way,” he said “No way Not after what we lost. Or that we would be playing for a third consecutive Big 12 title. Get out of here. Not this year especially how stacked this league is.”

Sampson will start new again next season, possibly having to replace four starters. The Cougars likely won’t be as young, but there inevitably will be a transition period.

“Next year, like every year, I’ll have a new team, and I’ll have to start over with that team,” he said. “But we always expect the same results.”