The inevitable pairing in the SEC/Big 12 Challenge, now in its ninth season, is finally here — on Saturday at the Erwin Center, the Texas Longhorns are hosting the No. 18 Tennessee Volunteers and former Texas head coach Rick Barnes, who spent 17 seasons coaching the Longhorns before he was dismissed in 2015.
So the game marks a belated opportunity for fans to honor Barnes, who was told by then-athletics director Steve Patterson to fire members of his coaching staff or lose his own job following a disappointing 20-14 2014-15 season that included a loss to Butler in the opening round of the NCAA.