College basketball has become so popular that every school under the sun wants to join in the fun. Perhaps that’s why the Texas A&M-Corpus Christi Islanders decided to start their program in 1999 after decades without a basketball team. Since the Islands are still a young program, cheap Texas A&M-Corpus Christi basketball tickets are easy to find. However, the program has started to gain some recognition, with the Islanders proving they can play with the big boys. In fact, last-minute Texas A&M-Corpus Christi basketball tickets have become increasingly popular, setting the stage for the Islanders to have a promising future on the basketball court.

Shot Out of a Cannon

As should be expected of any program new to college basketball, especially at Division I level, Texas A&M-Corpus Christi had some struggles early in the program’s history. Ronnie Arrow was the first head coach and needed five seasons until he led the Islanders to their first winning season. But once that first winning season was out of the way, things progressed quickly for Texas A&M-Corpus Christi. Just three years later, in what would become Arrow’s last season with the Islands, he led Texas A&M-Corpus Christi to the NCAA Tournament for the first time after winning the Southland Conference Tournament. The Islanders actually had no. 2 seed Wisconsin on the ropes but couldn’t complete the upset. However, just getting to the Big Dance less than a decade into their existence was a huge accomplishment for the Islanders.

Always on the Rebound

Unfortunately for the Islanders, they couldn’t sustain the success of that NCAA Tournament appearance in 2007. But the program did enjoy three straight 20-win seasons under Willis Wilson, although Texas A&M-Corpus Christi would fall on hard times again by the end of the 2010s. But after Wilson retired in 2021, Steve Lutz quickly got the Islanders back to the top of the Southland, winning the conference tournament and getting Texas A&M-Corpus Christi back to the NCAA Tournament in 2022, setting the stage for a promising future.