According to reports /gestures everywhere/ (Denton Record Chronicle’s Brett Vito and CBS Sports’ Matt Norlander), University of North Texas head coach Grant McCasland will be named the head coach at Texas Tech today. To be clear, Jeff Goodman reported this would happen a couple of weeks ago so he was 1st out of the gate.

McCasland guided the Mean Green to a 31-7 record after beating UAB last night to win the NIT in Las Vegas, which avenges a loss in the Conference-USA Tournament.

North Texas was a decent offensive team this past year, 70th in Adjusted Offense, with a team that had a high turnover rate, 288th, and everything else pretty decent. 139th in eFG%, 36th in offensive rebounding, and a team that just didn’t get their shot blocked, 49th in the nation. Defensively is where North Texas shined, 22nd in Adjusted Defense, 5th in holding teams in eFG%, 16th in 3-point defense, and 7th in 2-point defense. Where UNT didn’t do well on defense is that they put teams on the line a lot, 339th in the nation, but teams didn’t make free throws, which I’ve never figured out if that’s luck?

UNT’s best player was Tylor Perry, a 5’11” point guard who transferred in from Coffeyville Community College. A couple of big men, Moulaye Sissoko transferred in from Dayton, and Abou Ousmane is home-grown in that he was recruited from Brooklyn to play in Denton. The thought here is that like any other coach, he’s pulling kids from different places to create a team isn’t uncommon in today’s world of college basketball.

McCasland started his coaching career at Texas Tech in 1999-2001 as director of operations after playing at Baylor. McCasland started coaching at Northeastern Junior College as an assistant, then was the head coach at midland and Midwestern State. McCasland spent 5 years at Baylor as an assistant before hopping on at Arkansas State for a year and then North Texas for the past 6 years. McCasland has an overall record of 210-89 (70.2% winning percentage) and an overall record at North Texas of 135-65 (67.5% winning percentage) with a conference record of 71-35 (67.0% winning percentage).

McCasland’s top assistant coach Ross Hodge will stay at North Texas and take over for McCasland. There was some thought that he would come along with McCasland.