head coach

Longhorns interim Rodney Terry named Men's College Basketball National Coach of the Year

Rodney Terry, interim coach for Texas Men's Basketball, is recognized for his efforts since December as interim head coach.

Photo courtesy of KVUE

Sporting News has named Rodney Terry, interim head coach of Texas Men's Basketball, as the Men's College Basketball National Coach of the Year.

Terry is the first coach in Texas Basketball program history to earn the prestigious award, according to the University of Texas at Austin.

The annual award is presented to the best men's college basketball head coach in the NCAA Division 1 competition. The first award was given back in 1964.

Terry was named acting head coach of the Longhorns in mid-December and named interim head coach for the remainder of the season in early January.

Since taking over in December, UT reports that Terry has guided the team to a 16-7 mark, including five wins against AP Top 25 opponents. The Longhorns are 7-1 under Terry in games decided by five points or less or in overtime.

The team has a 23-8 overall record (12-6 Big 12) entering this week's Philips 66 Big 12 Championship, in which Texas earned a No. 2 seed, marking the highest seed for the Longhorns at the tournament since 2011.

The Longhorns' 23 regular-season wins mark the most regular-season victories by Texas since the 2010-11 season (25-6). The team is 5-3 against AP Top 11 opponents this year, and the seven wins against AP-ranked teams are tied for the second-most in program history.

Texas is ranked No. 7 in the latest AP poll (out March 6) and has now been ranked in the top 10 of the AP poll for 16 consecutive weeks – the longest stretch since Texas was in the top 10 for all 19 polls during the 2002-03 Final Four season, according to UT.

In February, KVUE Sports Director Jeff Jones reported that Terry was on of three Big 12 coaches to earn his way onto the 15-person Naismith Men's Coach of the Year late-season watchlist. Jones spoke with Terry's players and opponents alike about his style and whether he deserves the Big 12 Coach of the Year award.

Read the full story and watch the video at KVUE.com.

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More Foraging

Free 'food forest' in East Austin expands with thousands of new plants

Angelina Alanis at Festival Beach Food Forest

Photo courtesy of KVUE

Angelina Alanis gives a tour of the garden, which is open to anyone.

In East Austin, there is an edible forest garden called Festival Beach Food Forest where anyone can walk around and harvest free produce, nuts, medicinal plant leaves and herbs. And over the summer, it grew to several times its size.

The forest has fig trees, peach trees, grapevines, asparagus and more that's not in season right now. You can grab passionfruit and plants like yaupon holly, with leaves that can make a caffeinated tea, rosemary and lemon balm.

"[Lemon balm] is part of the mint family," said Angelina Alanis, communication and partnership coordinator for Festival Beach Food Forest. "It has a lemony taste but it's good for a nervous stomach. I'm prone to anxiety so I always grab a hunk."

The food forest is located right next to Interstate 35 and Lady Bird Lake on 29 Waller St., near a part of town that's known for being a food desert, lacking grocery stores.

"There's as much as a 20-year life expectancy difference between parts of East and West Austin, and a lot of that comes down to food access, health care access and also access to nature."

Alanis said for the past nine years, the volunteer-based grassroots project been helping with the issue and just recently expanded in the summer from two-thirds of an acre of city parkland to over 3.5 acres.

"We're going to have hundreds of new trees," said Alanis. "We've already planted 150 new trees in the area and then thousands of plants on the ground."

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They also plan to add a community kitchen and a pavilion to do things like cooking classes or informational sessions.

Read the full story at KVUE.com.

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