Houston’s In “Championship Mode” and the Rest Of College Basketball Will Catch On To What Kelvin Sampson’s Pulled Off Soon Enough

It is not about tomorrow, it’s about today, about getting to another Monday night. This one in Detroit, 89 miles from where Kelvin Sampson convinced Jud Heathcote to give him a shirt and a chair, and his first coaching job of sorts. Make no mistake, this revamped University of Houston team is built to win at the highest level. Now.

“This program has been in championship mode for a while,” University of Houston lead assistant coach Kellen Sampson tells PaperCity. “So it’s not earth shattering news that we’re in championship mode. We’re in win now mode right now. Of course we are.

“And that’s why a lot of the new guys sought us out. Because they know what our objective is. They know what our goals are.”

Houston’s transfer portal additions — starting point guard Dedan Thomas Jr. (from LSU), starting center Delrecco Gillespie (Kent State), potential sixth man Corey Hadnot II (Purdue Fort Wayne), high-flying forward Braden East (Lamar) and the newly eligible instant energizer Chendall Weaver (Texas) — came to the Third Ward knowing the mission. And wanting every part of it.

“It was a big driver,” Thomas says. “Especially Coach Sampson called me out of the portal, he felt like I could be a big piece to helping this year’s team finally take that next step and win the big one.”

This Houston program does not shy away from championship expectations. This Kelvin Sampson roster revamp is built around the drive to win the national title this season. It is not to the level of Dusty May bringing in an all-transfer starting lineup and winning it all with Michigan last April. Houston still starts three players in power forward JoJo Tugler, shooting guard Mercy Miller and wing Chase McCarty who all have been with the program for at least three years.

“This program has been in championship mode for a while. So it’s not earth shattering news that we’re in championship mode. We’re in win now mode right now. Of course we are. And that’s why a lot of the new guys sought us out. Because they know what our objective is. They know what are goals are.” — UH lead assistant Kellen Sampson

Houston’s still Houston, but bolstered and carrying more of an edge than last season’s super freshmen powered team. And the college basketball world is already starting to notice. UH’s already been moved up several spots to No. 8 in the AP College Basketball Top 25 after two wins in two games Sampson’s team was heavily favored in. The Athletic’s college basketball guru C.J. Moore now has Houston in his top four. More and more smart basketball observers are realizing what’s happening.

With the Cougars only Wednesday night’s home game vs. overmatched Jacksonville State away from heading to Las Vegas for the showcase spotlight of the Players Era Festival and a possible second day showdown with No. 1 Florida, no one will be sleeping on Houston soon.

“I think it’s like a vintage Kelvin Sampson team,” ESPN’s Big 12 guru Fran Fraschilla tells PaperCity. “From the middle part of these last 13 years when they started to get really good. With a bunch of guys that just come out of nowhere and wear you down. I think they’re going to have a fun team. . .

“There’s whole nother group of Coogs coming up that the nation doesn’t really know much about. But they’re going to find out by January 1st.”

Maybe sooner.

Paint Touches

These remodeled Cougars have scored 44 and 50 points in the paint in their first two games. This is a team built to punish foes inside. With a point guard in Thomas who excels at getting the ball into the post. In the three-point happy, position-less, five-out offenses all the rage in basketball today, post entry passes are something of a lost art.

But Dedan Thomas’ game has always leaned a little old school. Which is something that drew the Sampsons to this lefty creator back when he was in high school. When Thomas’ own interest in a not yet powerhouse Houston program did not match Houston’s interest in him.

“When he was 15 years old we saw that,” Kellen Sampson says of Thomas’ craftiness and ability to see all the angles on a basketball court. “There are certain things that DJ has been doing since he started dribbling a ball that are unique and isolated simply to him. We’re blessed in that we’ve actually got a chance to see the whole picture. We saw him when he was a young fella.

“And we the chance to coach him now when he’s certainly older and he’s added a few things along the way. We’ve kind of known what we were sitting on for a while.”

What Houston was sitting on is another national championship level point guard, one who has 13 assists and one turnover through two games, one built to make this team’s inside emphasis succeed. Thomas is already showing the ability to get 7-foot true freshman center Arafan Diané the ball where the young big man can do something with it. Diané’s largely limited to three or four minute spurts right now, but as he becomes a bigger and bigger part of this team as the season goes on, Thomas’ post entry passes to him will become more important.

“We worked on it all summer,” Thomas says when I ask him about those post passes. “I think the chemistry between me and the bigs has gotten a lot better and better, practice by practice, game by game. They’ve got great hands so they make it easy on me. I just throw the ball in there and I know they’re going to catch it. . .

“I feel like we’ve got the best front court in the country.”

“Some teams have higher ceilings than others,” Kelvin Sampson says. “This team has a high ceiling. Which means they can get a lot better.”

Interestingly, both Kelvin Sampson and Fran Fraschilla bring up that 2021-22 Houston team that overcame season-ending injuries to its two best scorers to make it all the way to the Elite Eight as the closest parallel to this current UH squad.

“Just because depth of the front line,” Sampson says. “That team had Josh (Carlton) and Reggie (Chaney) and Fabian (White Jr.) and J’Wan (Roberts). So when those two guys (Marcus Sasser and Tramon (Mark) went down, I knew before Christmas Day how we had to play. That’s why I was excited.”

No one enjoys a coaching challenge more than Kelvin Sampson.

This revamped Houston team is also built off of what happened in 2025, when Kelvin Sampson’s program came as close to winning a national championship as you possibly can without actually doing it. If JoJo Tugler is not limited to 16 minutes by foul trouble on that Monday night against Florida, UH is almost assuredly a champion. Not long after that cruel final whistle, Sampson vowed not to be caught a big man short ever again.

That’s part of Championship Mode too. Having a four-deep frontline and building on every little tweak over the years. Count Corey Hadnot among the Houston players who’ve found the program’s use of VersaClimbers (something UH adopted into its training after losing to Duke in the 2024 Sweet 16) to be a daunting adjustment.

“The VersaClimber,” Hadnot tells PaperCity of the diabolical exercise machines that simulate full body climbing. “A lot of people don’t like that. I’m definitely one of those people who don’t like that. That’s a whole other type of pain when you get on that.

“That was definitely my welcome to Houston moment.”

Championship Mode is not supposed to be forgiving. It’s not comfortable. It’s always demanding.

“We know what we came here to do,” Gillespie says.

It is part of the pitch that drew this talented, experienced transfer portal class. This mission’s never been covert. The rest of college basketball will catch on soon enough.

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