Rodney Terry claims he did not hear Texas fans booing him when his name was announced

Coming off of a 103-80 blowout loss to Alabama on Tuesday, Texas coach Rodney Terry had a lot of tough questions to answer. One that came at the midway point in his press conference was about something that happened before the ball even tipped off.

As Terry was being introduced pregame to the home crowd at the Moody Center, a small portion of the crowd could be heard booing. It wasn’t incredibly loud or even a majority of the fans in attendance, but was noticeable enough to be brought up postgame.

Terry, however, said he didn’t hear them, but it wouldn’t have affected him if he had.

“I don’t pay attention to that stuff. I didn’t hear any boos,” the coach said. “I don’t know. Maybe there was, maybe there wasn’t. To me personally, I’m all about trying to get my team better. It’s about focusing on those guys. Focusing on what we need to do as a program and continuing to stay the course and keep working. I don’t get caught up in outside noise.”

The loss for Texas marked its third straight as it continues to slide down the SEC standings. The Longhorns are now 15-10 (4-8 SEC) on the year and squarely on the bubble, currently projected as a No. 9 seed in On3’s latest bracketolgy predictions.

Those projections do not account for the loss to the Crimson Tide, however, which might be enough to bump them down a line.

Rodney Terry is in his third season as head coach of the Longhorns after taking over for Chris Beard early in the 2022-23 season. He was previously an assistant under Beard as well as on Rick Barnes‘ staff from 2002-11.

Texas offered Terry the full time job after he led them to a 22-8 record, Big 12 Tournament Championship and Elite Eight appearance as interim coach. But since then, he is 36-23 across the next two seasons and had a second-round exit in last year’s tournament.

The first season in the SEC hasn’t gone according to plan, but the league is packed full of some of the best teams in college basketball. Terry and Texas still have time to turn things around to close the regular season, and he isn’t giving any mind to the criticism.

“If I’m worried about what people are saying or this or that, that’s not my job,” Terry said. “There’s not anything anybody can say or do to me. I’ve got the No. 1 protector in God. I’ve got strong faith. I’m a Christian guy. Nothing anybody can ever say can bring me down. So I don’t get caught up in that. I didn’t hear (the booing), if that was the case.”

The Longhorns will look to turn things around when they host Kentucky on Saturday.

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