Let’s be honest: neither team deserved to win this hideous basketball game. But someone had to, and Oklahoma State (12-5, 5-5) handed No. 6 Texas (11-5, 5-4) its fourth loss in its last five games by beating it in double overtime, 75-67. Here are 10 postgame thoughts after I've rinsed my eyes with eye drops and taking a shot:
1) Many don’t want to hear it immediately after the loss, but the COVID-19 issues that swept through the Texas program knocked it to the mat. Right now, this is a program trying to regain its strength, its form and is woozy picking itself up while trying to shake unusually difficult challenges mentally and physically. It’s not an excuse. It’s the truth. These guys all, generally speaking, just lived through the worst of a pandemic that's wrecked the world. These guys aren’t robots, and their confidence wavered throughout today’s loss.
2) Now, that said, the COVID-19 issues that wrecked the program’s rhythm and progress didn’t have anything to do with practicing basketball insanity against Oklahoma State. The Cowboys, partially because of key players in foul trouble, switched to a soft, 2-3 zone and the Longhorns proceeded to fire up brick after brick with the same bad, perimeter-oriented attack in the second half and overtime.
Sure, there were times when Texas threw the ball to someone at the free throw line and generated easy offense or whipped the ball around side-to-side with pace. You’d think seeing that work would lead a team, and particularly a coaching staff, to at least try to force that type of execution. It didn’t. And sure, there were occasions when Texas simply missed wide open three-pointers. But UT’s offense issues were largely the result of doing the same thing all game despite poor results.
“I thought both teams showed a lot of fight throughout the second half. We obviously didn't play with the level of poise we need to have on offense,” said Shaka Smart after the game. “We missed a lot of shots, which, you know, I think we're mostly very good looks. Obviously, we'd love to have some of those shots back. But the 21 turnovers is way too many. I thought our guys defended really well for the most part in the second half. But you know, there were some crucial possessions where we just didn't finish the way we needed to.”
Smart and Matt Coleman both felt Texas missed a lot of good looks. And, again, there were definitely some shots as wide open as guys will get that were missed. Respectfully, though, I disagree today was an instance of just a make-or-miss game on offense going against Texas. Confidence can be influenced by a system and situation. Texas lost confidence on offense.
3) If Texas had any semblance of half-court offensive execution and any variety to its attack to end regulation, it would have easily put Oklahoma State away and left with an underserved road win. The Texas guards weren’t nearly good enough, and for perhaps the first time this year, they were a net negative. However, the Texas coaching staff didn’t do anything different to at least attempt to pull them out of their offensive funk. And this loss, a crucial one in league play, falls on it.
So often in the past we’ve seen Smart’s offenses ride-and-die with guard freedom and decision-making. This season, it’s often worked as Texas has tweaked some of its ball-screen usage with “ghost” screens and other wrinkles for good, more experienced and more mature guards. But we saw today what happens when those guards aren’t executing, aren’t making the right decisions and aren’t making shots. Even Texas feasting on the offensive glass couldn’t bail it out. Besides a small adjustment here or there, it was practicing basketball insanity on offense. Perhaps what's so infuriating about watching that offense is when it does something different, perhaps by accident, that is so easy and yet so effective. And then the control isn't taken from the guards to try to do similar...
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