As they typically do, the No. 14 Longhorns (14-7, 8-6) fought back against a quality Big 12 opponent and had an opportunity to win late. But as they’ve also done too often this season, Texas hurt itself with crucial mistakes down the stretch, which led to a frustrating 68-59 loss at No. 18 Texas Tech (15-8, 7-7).
“I thought we had some terrific defensive possessions. And I thought we had some terrible defensive possessions. I believe when they went on their run, they scored on either seven out of eight or eight out of nine possessions,” said Shaka Smart, who later responded he was more upset with the lack of defense to begin the second half than poor offense, referencing Texas Tech’s run early in the second half. “You can't allow that on the road. You just can't.
"On the offensive end even though we shot 50% in the first half, I thought the whole game we were forcing some shots before we needed to. We were not in the flow that we needed to be in to continue moving the ball. And obviously that caught up with us in the second half with the way we shot the ball. We need to be much, much better on offense.”
Following a very entertaining, back-and-forth first half that ended with Matt Coleman exploiting Tech’s switching man-to-man for a dunk and buzzer-beating three to tie the game, Texas Tech significantly elevated its defensive aggressiveness, execution and energy in the second half. Texas didn’t make a field goal until the 11:02 mark in the second half, and it was fortunate to be down just 52-42 after the make. After connecting on 5-of-10 three-pointers in the first half, Texas made just 2-of-14 the second period, but that didn’t stop it, as usual, from running its same offense and becoming too stagnant. According to BartTorvik.com, UT's adjusted offensive efficiency was its fifth-worst mark of the season.
After Jericho Sims and Kai Jones exploited Tech’s lack of height and switching in the first half, the UT bigs were met with more aggressive double and sometimes triple-teaming on paint touches. That, combined with Tech’s ball-screen defense pushing UT’s guards to uncomfortable areas, resulted in a lengthy poor stretch of offense by Texas. The Longhorns, despite Andrew Jones barely playing in the first half because of foul trouble, shot 50% from the floor during the first period. But once the lobs to the bigs in mismatches went away, Texas fell into its perimeter-oriented trap.
“I thought throughout the game when we did look to throw it up to our bigger guys, we had some advantages,” said Smart. “Our guards have really helped us win a lot of big games and made some of those shots today. I'm sure we will look at the tape, and there's quite a few that we’ll pull off and say, ‘We didn't need that shot with 15 seconds on the shot clock.’ I thought our level of willingness to just keep moving and keep attacking was not good enough today… we have to, and we've been pretty good with this most of the year, we have to understand against a good defensive team, you got to make them work.”
Meanwhile, the Red Raiders used suffocating defense and a lack of UT paint touches to fuel quick-paced offense the other way with Texas on its heels and reeling. But they couldn’t put the Longhorns away despite their defense not being up to their high standards. Once Texas finally saw a field goal go through the net, it elevated its defense and began making the types of aggressive plays the home team was.
Texas Tech didn’t make a field goal from the 10:00 mark to the 5:00 mark as Texas elevated its defense. However, the Red Raiders were given three extremely valuable free throws when the league’s best flopper, Mac McClung, pump-faked late in the shot clock, lost and fumbled the ball going up in the air and initiated contact with a stationary Kai Jones. The move was rewarded to give Texas Tech a 57-51 lead and immediately followed officials calling a common foul on what should have been a flagrant when Kai Jones’s legs were hit on a dunk attempt and sent him flying to the floor awkwardly. Texas Tech made 20-of-26 free throws while Texas made 18-of-27.
“I got nothing, man,” responded a frustrated Smart when asked if he received an explanation why the foul on Kai Jones wasn’t a flagrant. “I thought it was as well. I thought, you know, you have to be careful on those plays because a guy can get put in a dangerous position. But they ended up calling it a common foul.”
While the officiating definitely changed the feel of the game after Texas cut the deficit to six points with just under seven minutes remaining, it wasn’t the reason Texas lost. Rather, the Longhorns repeatedly made costly mistakes down the stretch of the game as Texas Tech left the door open for a stolen road win. Courtney Ramey anticipated a pass to the paint on a baseline drive, came up with the steal, and excellent ball movement in transition led to an Andrew Jones three-pointer with 3:22 remaining. Texas Tech, leading 59-56, called a timeout, which began the puzzling decision-making, especially for an experienced team that talks so much about playing with poise.
Matt Coleman bumped McClung late in the shot clock, which sent him to the free throw line; Kai Jones attempted a poor, early-clock three-pointer and resulted in Andrew Jones fouling a Texas Tech player in the open floor; Ramey missed a driving layup that would have cut the score to 62-60 Tech; and after another defensive stop, Coleman lost his handle in traffic and turned the ball over.
Both teams were basically even in assists, turnovers and rebounding. But Texas Tech made eight more two-point shots and attempted 12 more. The game was closer than the final score because Texas began to bomb away from three and foul, but once again, the strategy of living-and-dying with guard play on offense went against the Longhorns. Against Kansas, it didn’t. Against West Virginia, it did. Coleman, Ramey and Andrew Jones scored just 24 points on 6-of-24 shooting from the floor.
Such is life in the Big 12 for Texas under Smart. Texas is on the road again Tuesday against Iowa State, who is winless in conference play but recently took No.2 Baylor, coming off a very, very long COVID-19 pause, to the wire.
