College basketball has featured plenty of one-hit wonders where a team comes out of nowhere and shocks the nation for one season but completely disappears the next year.
Building a program that is successful year after year, however, is a much different challenge.
Now in his 28th season as a head coach for a Division I basketball program, Kelvin Sampson knows the difference between having a good team for one year and consistently having one that is competing for championships.
“You can bump up one year and have a kid transfer out of the blue that you didn’t know was available, and all of the sudden you have a good team and everybody thinks you’re really good,” Sampson said.