Twenty-five of the 26 teams in the CBS Sports Top 25 And 1 played Monday. All of them won, most of them easily. So nothing too interesting happened on the opening day of the 2022-23 college basketball season — but Houston’s Kelvin Sampson did record his 700th career win via an 83-36 victory over Northern Colorado. That’s notable and a reminder that Sampson has built Houston into one of the best programs in the country in a way that should eventually have him enshrined in the Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame.
“It’s been a wonderful journey,” Sampson said. “I have so many people to thank.”
Sampson’s head-coaching career started at Montana Tech in 1981 and has included stops at Washington State, Oklahoma, Indiana and Houston. He’s been great everywhere, taken the Sooners and Cougars to the Final Four and is now in control of a team that arguably gives him his best chance ever to win the national championship. Caesars Sportsbook currently lists Houston as +1000 to win the 2023 NCAA Tournament, behind only North Carolina and Kentucky at +900. The star of the roster is Marcus Sasser, a CBS Sports Preseason First Team All-American who finished with 21 points on 50% shooting from the field in the season-opening destruction of Northern Colorado.
“It was exciting, fun, a lot of emotions, really,” said Sasser, who was limited to just 12 appearances last season because of a toe injury that sidelined him for good just before Christmas. “It’s been almost 11 months since I have been out there with this group of guys. Being out there with them tonight, it was real fun and exciting to see all the hard work we’ve been putting in since June pay off.”
With the 47-point victory, Houston remains No. 3 in Tuesday morning’s updated Top 25 And 1. The Cougars’ next game is Friday against Saint Joseph’s in the opener of the Veterans Classic, which can be watched on CBS Sports Network at 6 p.m. ET.