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Kelvin Sampson: "I think we're going to be pretty good."

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UPDATED: May 8, 2019 -- 12:30 p.m. CT

POSTED: May 8, 2019 -- 12:07 p.m. CT

Houston Cougars Men's Basketball Head Coach Kelvin Sampson was guest on the NCAA's "March Madness 365 with Andy Katz" podcast recently.

During his segment of the podcast, Sampson discusses the culture he and his coaching staff have established at UH; the work which remains at UH as well as why he chose to stay at UH rather than take a job elsewhere.

Sampson also references the team's upcoming trip to Italy; the 2019-'20 roster; the NCAA rule proposal to move the three-point line further away from the basket to match the 3-point line in international (FIBA) competition.

Here's a transcript of part of the podcast.

"We're going to Rome, Florence, and Venice," Sampson told Katz regarding the team's trip to Italy in August.

"I think we're going to be pretty good," Sampson continued.

"Our backcourt is solid: DeJon Jarreau (6'5"); Armoni Brooks (6'3"); Nate Hinton (6'5"). We have a really good freshman from North Carolina, Caleb Mills (6'4"), sitting out. We signed a really good guard - Marcus Sasser (6'2"), tough kid.

"I like our backcourt. Strength of our team, I think, we'll be our frontcourt. Fabian White's (6'7") back. Brison Gresham's (6'8") back. Chris Harris (6'10") is back. We sat out a kid that I really like, Justin Gorham (6'7") -- who'll probably be the truest stretch-four we've had since we've been here -- kid that transferred from Towson State. And, then, we have another freshman coming in, J'Wan Roberts. He's about 6'8", 215. Quick twitch. High-level, high-level athlete.

"So, we've got good pieces. I think this trip - the practices leading up to it - will be good for us."



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Next, Katz asked Sampson about Houston's non-conference schedule for the 2019-'20 season.

'Any games that you know of that are new on the schedule?" Katz asked.

"We have the return at Oregon," Sampson said. "BYU comes to our place. Oklahoma State comes to our place. We're in the Diamond Head Classic in Hawaii. That's three games. We have a game at Rice. We're in the SEC / AAC Challenge.

And, then, we've got a couple of things that I could break right now that's been agreed upon. We just haven't finished the contract. But, I'm excited about it."

Andy Katz chimed in quickly, "Well, we'd be more than happy to share that, if you want."

Coach Sampson (Laughing) replied, "Yeah. Yeah. I better not. It'd be no better place to do it than right here that's for sure. Well, let's just say there's a HUGE preseason tournament. A lot of people would love to be in; and, that Houston is going to be a part of."

Click here to listen to the entire podcast.

In summary, Houston's 2019-'20 non-conference schedule appears to be challenging. For comparison, the 2018-'19 non-conference schedule was announced last year in July.

CLICK HERE for news and info about the Coogs' men's basketball team.

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