Coaching Staff

Assistant Coach | Jeff Linder

Jeff Linder is in his first season as a Texas Tech assistant coach after earning 143 victories as the head coach at Wyoming and Northern Colorado over the last eight seasons. The announcement was made on May 14, 2024.

Linder arrived in Lubbock following four seasons in Laramie where he led the Cowboys to a 63-59 overall record. He posted an impressive 80-50 record in four seasons as the head coach at Northern Colorado where he was named the Big Sky Coach of the Year during the 2018-19 season. His tenure at Wyoming was highlighted by a 25-9 record in 2021-22 and an at-large bid to the 2022 NCAA Tournament. The Cowboys were ranked as high as No. 22 during that season and he was one of 15 coaches in the nation named to the Werner Naismith Coach of the Year Late Season Watch List by the Atlanta Tipoff Club.

Linder was an assistant coach for two seasons under McCasland at Midland College, including the 2005-06 season when the Chaps went 26-10 and advanced to the NJCAA Elite Eight. Midland was 53-16 during the two season when it was led by the pairing of McCasland and Linder.

Linder was named head coach at for the first time at Northern Colorado where he led the Bears to 15 conference wins for a program record during the 2018-19 and 2019-20 seasons. He led Northern Colorado to the most wins during a three-year stretch in program history, with 69 victories, including going 26-12 in the 2017-18 season and 22-9 in 2019-20.

Prior to his time as a head coach, Linder spent six seasons at Boise State with the final three years serving as associate head coach of the Broncos. Linder helped guide Boise State to two NCAA tournament appearances and the team's first Mountain West Conference Championship. Boise State won 20-or-more games in five of Linder's six seasons in Idaho, including in 2014-15 when the Broncos tied the school record for wins with a 25-9 record.

Linder began his coaching career as the assistant director of men's basketball operations at Colorado under head coach Ricardo Patton. After one season at CU, Linder was hired as an assistant coach on David Moe's staff at Emporia State, where he spent three seasons. Emporia State went 22-5 during his final campaign and earned the third seed in the NCAA Division II Tournament. He also spent time as an assistant coach at San Francisco and Weber State. Linder helped Weber State to a 36-26 overall record, and in 2006-07 the Wildcats won the Big Sky Conference regular-season and tournament titles and earned a trip to the NCAA Tournament. Linder also recruited Damian Lillard to Weber State, who was selected sixth-overall by the Portland Trail Blazers in the 2012 NBA Draft.

A Lafayette, Colorado native, he began his collegiate playing career at Mesa State before transferring to Western State Colorado where he played three seasons under coach Bob Hofman. As a Mountaineer, Linder was a three-time All-Rocky Mountain Conference selection.

Linder and his wife, Kelli, have four children, two daughters, Adison and Makalyn, and two sons, Jordan and Devon.

Assistant Coach | Matt Braeur

Matt Braeuer is in his second season at Texas Tech as an assistant coach after spending the past five seasons working with head coach Grant McCasland at North Texas.

He helped to lead the Red Raiders to the 2024 NCAA Tournament and a 23-win season in his first year. Tech finished tied for third in the Big 12 standings and advanced to the semifinals of the 2024 Big 12 Championship.

Braeuer was on McCasland’s staff at UNT for five seasons, while Moikobu was an assistant coach for the Mean Green one season. UNT established a new program record by going 31-7 and completed the 2022-23 season by knocking off UAB to secure the NIT title. The Mean Green led the nation by limiting opponents to only 55.8 points per game, were sixth nationally by holding teams to 39.1 percent shooting, and ran off postseason victories over Alcorn State, Sam Houston, Oklahoma State and Wisconsin before the 68-61 win over UAB for the championship. Along with team success, Wright helped develop two Conference USA Player of the Year selections in Javion Hamlet (2020) and Tylor Perry (2023).

In his five seasons with UNT, Braeuer helped guide the Mean Green to a 115-47 record along with back-to-back Conference USA championships (2020 and 2021) and the program's first NCAA Tournament victory with a win over Purdue in the 2021 NCAA Tournament. A Belton, Texas native, Braeuer was a three-year starting point guard at Wichita State from 2004-08. Braeuer came to the Mean Green from the College of Charleston, where he had served for two years and helped lead the Cougars to back-to-back 25-win seasons and Colonial Athletic Association regular-season and tournament titles.

“He is a relentless recruiter with a brilliant basketball mind,” McCasland said of Braeuer. “He had success as a player and had coached at the highest levels. He also has a great feel for what winning looks like.”

He began his coaching career as a graduate assistant at Wichita State and would spend one year at Midland College from 2010-11 where he helped lead the Chaparrals to a 33-4 record and to the NJCAA Division I national championship game. Braeuer would continue his career at the University of Maryland, working under head coach Mark Turgeon as the video coordinator and then at Sam Houston from 2013-16. He helped lead Sam Houston to the Southland Conference tournament championship game in back-to-back seasons and to seasons that resulted in 24 and 26 victories.

As a player at Wichita State, Braeuer ranks in the top 15 all-time in career three-pointers made (130) and career assists (308) for the Shockers. During his playing time at Wichita, the Shockers advanced to the Sweet Sixteen and earned a top-10 national ranking. Braeuer played under his father Ed Braeuer at Belton High, where as a senior, he was named a Texas Class 5A First Team All-State, First Team All-Region selection and earned District 13-5A Most Valuable Player.

Assistant Coach | Luke Barnwell

Luke Barnwell is in his second season with the Texas Tech men's basketball program as an assistant coach for Grant McCasland after recording an impressive 224-39 record in 10 seasons at Sunrise Christian Academy. He was named the 2021 and 2022 Naismith High School Boys Coach of the Year and led Sunrise Christian to the 2022 National Interscholastic Basketball Conference Championship.

Barnwell helped to lead the Red Raiders to the 2024 NCAA Tournament and a 23-win season in his first year. Tech finished tied for third in the Big 12 standings and advanced to the semifinals of the 2024 Big 12 Championship.

He has spent the last eight seasons leading the Sunrise Christian Elite team where he compiled a 178-28 record competing against the elite basketball programs in the nation. Barnwell led SCA to five consecutive GEICO Nationals and has coached over 75 NCAA Division I players and worked with six NBA players. His team was ranked No. 1 throughout the 2022 season and won the inaugural NIBC. The program once again advanced to the final four of the GEICO High School National Tournament in 2023 with an upset of the top seed. He coached NBA players Kennedy Chandler, Kendall Brown, Gradey Dick and Ochai Agbaji and helped train Buddy Hield and Ron Baker.

“Coach Barnwell has great head coaching experience and has recruited and coached some of the best players around the world,” McCasland said. “He’s got great basketball feel but his ability to relate to players is what separates him. We are thrilled to have him part of our coaching staff.”

Barnwell began his time at SCA as the head coach of the post-grad basketball team where he led the program to a 41-13 record from 2012-15. He earned Midwest Prep Coach of the Year in 2015 and would help 13 players advance to NCAA Division I programs.

Additionally, Barnwell gained coaching experience within the Mokan Nike Elite program where he was the head coach of Mokan 17U Select in 2014 and Mokan 15U Elite in 2015. He also assisted Mokan programs from 2016-18.

An Emporia, Kansas native, Barnwell played college basketball at Newman University and Emporia State before beginning his coaching career as a student assistant. He graduated from Newman University with a bachelor’s in Sports Communications with an emphasis in coaching.

Assistant Coach | Achoki Moikobu

Achoki Moikobu is in his second season at Texas Tech as an assistant coach for Grant McCasland.

Moikobu was an assistant coach for McCasland for one season, helping the Mean Green establish a new program record by going 31-7 and completing the 2022-23 season by knocking off UAB to secure the NIT title.

Moikobu joined the Red Raider program after prior collegiate experience at UNT, Drake and Grand Canyon University. At Drake, Moikobu helped lead the Bulldogs to a 13-5 Missouri Valley Conference record and a MVC Tournament title game appearance. Prior to Drake, Moikobu spent one season under Bryce Drew at Grand Canyon in 2020-21 as the Director of Recruiting.

The Mean Green led the nation by limiting opponents to only 55.8 points per game in his lone season at UNT, were sixth nationally by holding teams to 39.1 percent shooting, and ran off postseason victories over Alcorn State, Sam Houston, Oklahoma State and Wisconsin before the 68-61 win over UAB for the championship.

He helped assemble a roster that transformed GCU from a 13-17 record to 17-7 and claim a Western Athletic Conference regular season league title. Grand Canyon then won the 2021 WAC Tournament championship and earned its first Division I NCAA Tournament berth. With Moikobu on staff in 2020-21, GCU featured the nation's second-best field goal percentage defense (37.6 percent) and the nation's 15th-best offensive field goal percentage (49.2 percent). Moikobu also worked six seasons as a postgraduate head coach at Sunrise Christian Academy in Bel Air, Kansas. At Sunrise, he coached 28 future Division I players.

“Coach AC has great experience as a head coach in prep school and a great assistant coach for us,” McCasland said of Moikobu. “He does a great job of developing and building relationships. He is as authentic as it gets. I think he has a tremendous overall perspective of the game and is really special in individual workouts because he understands how to get the best out of players on a daily basis.”

A Seattle, Washington native, Moikobu played at Fort Hays State where he graduated in 2015. In his two seasons at Fort Hays State, he made 91 career 3-pointers and shot 47.7 percent from deep.