In his first season as a head coach, Metcalf's team went 18–7, winning the Southwest Conference, the Aggies' first conference championship in 41 years. Metcalf's teams won a total of six conference championships (1964, 1969, 1975, 1976, 1980, 1986) and only placed lower than fourth in the conference six times. Under Metcalf, the A&M team made five NCAA tournament appearances, including two Sweet Sixteen appearances in 1969 (when only 25 teams were invited to the tournament) and 1980. The latter team won 26 games—a school record that stood until 2006-07—beating North Carolina in double overtime in the second round of the tournament before just missing advancing to the Elite Eight with an overtime loss to eventual champion Louisville. Twenty-four of Metcalf's players earned first-team all-conference citations and John Beasley was named a first-team All-American by the Helms Foundation in 1966. Eighteen players were drafted by professional basketball leagues, including Sonny Parker, who was a 1976 first-round NBA draft pick. In 1971, the A&M men's basketball color barrier was broken when Metcalf personally convinced Mario Brown, an African-American player, to attend the school. Brown later earned second-team All-Southwest Conference honors and was selected as a team co-captain. Metcalf's success prompted the primarily football-focused student body to begin paying attention to basketball. The A&M basketball arena, G. Rollie White Coliseum, often sold out and soon became known as the "Holler House on the Brazos". Metcalf took full advantage of the noisy arena, earning a doctorate in Recreation and Resource Development from Texas A&M in 1974 with a dissertation titled "Crowd Behavior at Southwest Conference Games". The longest serving basketball coach in Southwest Conference history, Metcalf was fired after feuding with Athletic Director John David Crow midway through the 1989–1990 season. When asked by the media what happened between the two, Metcalf remarked, "I made a comment that I didn't think John David was all that bright. And I thought I was being generous." The next year the Aggies began what would grow into a fifteen-year basketball slump that included only one winning season. The team did not approach Metcalf's success until 2005, when A&M hired former UTEP coach Billy Gillispie. Gillispie reached out to Metcalf, inviting him to practices and encouraging him to attend the home games. Post-coaching career After being relieved of his coaching duties, Metcalf worked for the A&M Center of Academic Enhancement. Until 1994, he often spoke at banquets,