Early history (1945–56) Although the University of Houston already had a women's basketball program, the Houston Cougars men's basketball program did not begin until the 1945–46 season.
Alden Pasche was the team's first head coach. In their first two seasons, the Cougars won
Lone Star Conference regular-season titles and qualified for postseason play in the
NAIA Men's Basketball tournaments in
1946 and
1947. The Cougars had an all-time NAIA tournament record of 2–2 in two years. During Pasche's tenure, the Cougars posted a 135–116 record. Under his leadership in 1950, the Cougars won the
Gulf Coast Conference championship. Future
College Basketball Hall of Fame coach
Guy Lewis played for Pasche, eventually becoming an assistant coach before being handed the job upon Pasche's retirement.
Guy Lewis era (1956–86) blocks a shot against UCLA in the 1968
Game of the Century. performs a
slam dunk as a member of the Houston Cougars men's basketball team under Lewis. Pasche retired after the 1955–56 season, and Houston assistant
Guy Lewis was promoted to the head coaching position. Lewis, a former Cougar player, led Houston to 27 straight winning seasons and 14 seasons with 20 or more wins, including 14 trips to the
NCAA tournament. His Houston teams made the Final Four on five occasions (1967, 1968, 1982–84) and twice advanced to the
NCAA Championship Game (1983, 1984). Among the outstanding players who Lewis coached are
Elvin Hayes,
Hakeem Olajuwon,
Clyde Drexler,
Otis Birdsong,
Dwight Jones,
Dwight Davis,
Don Chaney and
Louis "Sweet Lou" Dunbar. Lewis's UH teams twice played key roles in high-profile events that helped to popularize college basketball as a spectator sport. In 1968, his underdog, Elvin Hayes-led Cougars upset the undefeated and top-ranked UCLA Bruins in front of more than 50,000 fans at Houston's
Astrodome. The game became known as the “
Game of the Century” and marked a watershed in the popularity of college basketball. In the early 1980s, Lewis's
Phi Slama Jama teams at UH gained notoriety for their fast-breaking, "above the rim" style of play as well as their overall success. These teams attracted great public interest with their entertaining style of play. At the height of Phi Slama Jama's notoriety, they suffered a dramatic, last-second loss in the 1983 NCAA Final that set a then-ratings record for college basketball broadcasts and became an iconic moment in the history of the sport. Lewis's insistence that these highly successful teams play an acrobatic, up-tempo brand of basketball that emphasized
dunking brought this style of play to the fore and helped popularize it amongst younger players. Houston lost in both NCAA Final games in which Lewis coached, despite his "
Phi Slama Jama" teams featuring superstars
Clyde Drexler and
Hakeem Olajuwon. In 1983, Houston lost in a dramatic title game to the
North Carolina State Wolfpack on a last-second dunk by
Lorenzo Charles. The Cougars lost in the 1984 NCAA Final to the
Georgetown Hoyas, led by
Patrick Ewing. Lewis retired from coaching in 1986 at number 20 in all-time NCAA Division I victories, his 592–279 record giving him a .680 career winning percentage. As a coach, Lewis was known for championing the once-outlawed
dunk, which he characterized as a "high percentage shot", and for clutching a brightly colored red-and-white polka dot towel on the bench during games. Lewis was a major force in the racial integration of college athletics in the South during the 1960s, being one of the first major college coaches in the region to actively recruit African-American athletes. His recruitment of
Elvin Hayes and
Don Chaney in 1964 ushered in an era of tremendous success in Cougar basketball. The dominant play of Hayes led the Cougars to two Final Fours and sent shock waves through Southern colleges that realized that they would have to begin recruiting black players if they wanted to compete with integrated teams.
Welcome to Conference USA (1996–2004) After 21 years in the
Southwest Conference, the Cougars joined
Conference USA in 1996. Under head coach
Alvin Brooks, the basketball program had a disappointing initial season in C-USA. The team went 3–11 against C-USA teams in 1996–97. The next season was even more futile. Brooks, who had led the Cougars since 1993, coached the Cougars to a rock bottom conference record of 2–14 in 1997–98. The last, and only other, time the Cougars recorded only two conference victories in a season was in 1950–51; their first season in the
Missouri Valley Conference. One of
Houston's biggest sports icons and one of the Cougars best basketball players ever,
Clyde Drexler was hired to coach the program that he led as a player to the 1983 NCAA Final as part of
Phi Slama Jama. Basketball excitement was back on campus, and fans looked forward to the promising years to come. After just two seasons with minimal success, Drexler resigned as head coach citing his intention to spend more time with his family.
Ray McCallum was hired to do what Clyde Drexler could not—lead the Cougars to a winning season and earn a spot in the
NCAA tournament. After losing seasons in each of his first two years, McCallum guided the Cougars to an 18–15 record in 2001–02. That season, the team won two conference tournament games and qualified for the
National Invitation Tournament. However, the team regressed in the following season and failed to qualify for even their own C-USA tournament.
Two steps forward, one step back (2004–07) Tom Penders was named as the head coach of Cougars basketball in 2004. Known as "Turnaround Tom" for his reputation of inheriting sub-par basketball programs and making them better, Penders was hired to rebuild a program that recorded only one winning season in its last eight years. After a surprising debut season in 2004–05 that led to an NIT appearance, the team had high hopes to build on their relative success and make the NCAA tournament in 2006. The 2005–06 season looked promising at the outset. The Cougars started their first game on a 30–0 scoring run against the
Florida Tech Panthers. Less than two weeks later, the Cougars beat the nationally ranked
LSU Tigers on the road and the
Arizona Wildcats at home. The surprising wins earned the Cougars their first national ranking in several years. The team that seemed destined for an NCAA tournament berth failed to capitalize on their success and national recognition and began to stumble after a loss to
South Alabama Jaguars in December. The Cougars won only one conference tournament game and had to settle again for another NIT bid. Dubbed as "The Show," the 2006–07 Cougars entered the season with cockiness and strong expectations to finally make it into the NCAA tournament. A difficult schedule matched the Cougars with seven different teams that would end up qualifying for either the 2007 NCAA tournament or NIT. Houston lost three times to the
Memphis Tigers and once each to Arizona, the
Creighton Bluejays, the
Kentucky Wildcats, South Alabama, the
UNLV Runnin' Rebels, and the
VCU Rams. By going 0–9 against these quality teams, the Cougars proved they were not worthy of an
at-large bid to the NCAA tournament. Not surprisingly, two conference tournament wins against lower seeds and an unimpressive 18–15 overall record were not even enough to earn the team an invitation to the NIT.
Team goal: NCAA tournament (2007–10) In 2007–08 the team introduced a new nickname ("The Show—In 3D") and a slightly new uniform (a changed trim design). The team hoped to reach the NCAA tournament for the first time since
1992. Eight straight home games from November 21 to December 29 helped the Cougars get off to an 11–1 start. However, the team lost most of its critical games at the end of the season, including their last two games (both against the
UTEP Miners). Houston received an invitation to the
inaugural College Basketball Invitational tournament and defeated the
Nevada Wolf Pack and the
Valparaiso Crusaders but lost to their conference rival, the
Tulsa Golden Hurricane, in the semifinal round. The
2008–09 season began on November 11 with a two-point loss to the
Georgia Southern Eagles; this was the first game of the Division I college basketball season and the opening game of the 2K Sports Classic tournament in
Durham, North Carolina. A Cougars win would have meant a second round matchup with the
Duke Blue Devils. Overall, the Cougars played a balanced home and away regular season schedule. Fifteen games (three in November, three in December, four in January, three in February, and two in March) were played at
Hofheinz Pavilion. There were 14 away games (two in November, two in December, five in January, and five in February). The
2009–10 team finished the regular season 15–15 and 7–9 in C-USA, finishing seventh place in the conference. Following a 93–80 win over
East Carolina in the first round of the C–USA Tournament, the Cougars beat
Memphis 66–65, ending a string of four tournament titles for the Tigers. In the next game, they defeated
Southern Miss 74–66 to advance to the championship game. Finally, the Cougars beat #25 ranked
UTEP 81–73 to earn the conference's bid to the
NCAA tournament, their first since 1992. In the first round of the NCAA tournament, Houston, seeded 13th, was defeated 89–77 by 4th-seeded
Maryland. Penders announced his resignation as Houston head coach on March 22, 2010. The school hired
James Dickey on March 21, 2010.
Joining the American (2013–23) Beginning with the 2013–14 season, Houston joined the newly created
American Athletic Conference following the
Big East realignment. In March 2014, Dickey stepped down as head coach because of "private family matters". In four seasons with Houston, Dickey amassed a 64–62 record with no NCAA tournament appearances or conference titles. , courtside in 2023 On April 3, 2014, Houston hired
Kelvin Sampson as the new Cougars head coach. Sampson had just become eligible to be a college coach again after receiving a five-year show cause penalty in 2008 for sanctions against him during his time as
Indiana head coach. They would lose to eventual national champions
Baylor in the Final Four. During the
2021–22 season, the Cougars won the AAC regular season championship with a 15–3 conference record. They then defeated Cincinnati, Tulane and Memphis to win the
conference tournament. With the conference championship, an overall record of 29–5 and ranked No. 15 in the nation, Houston received a #5 seed in the
NCAA tournament. In the tournament, UH defeated UAB, Illinois and Arizona before losing to Villanova in the Elite Eight. In
2022–23, the Cougars' last season in the AAC, the team reached the number one ranking in the AP Poll, marking the first time they had held the top spot since
1983. after Houston's 70–67 win over
Duke in the
2025 Final Four in
San Antonio.
Big 12 In September 2021, the University of Houston was invited to join the
Big 12 Conference, along with Cincinnati, UCF and BYU. The Cougars began Big 12 play in the 2023–24 season. In their first year of play, the Cougars went 32–5 overall, 15–3 in conference play, to claim an outright regular season title. In the
2024–25 season, the Cougars enjoyed one of the most successful campaigns in school history. They won both the Big 12 Conference regular-season and tournament titles, earned the No. 1 seed in the
NCAA tournament, and advanced to the national championship game. En route to the final, they survived close contests against
Purdue in the Sweet 16 and a heavily favoured
Duke Team in the national semifinal. In the championship game, the Cougars surrendered a lead of as many as 12 points before narrowly losing to
Florida in the closing moments. ==Conference affiliations==