The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
University of Texas
Texas Southern
Men's Basketball tops Texas Southern, 98-61
11.28.2007 | Men's Basketball
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) -- Damion James had 19 points and 10 rebounds and No. 8 Texas ran its record to 6-0 for only the second time in coach Rick Barnes' 10 seasons with a 98-61 win over Texas Southern on Wednesday night.
Getting a seventh straight win is likely to be much tougher: the Longhorns travel to California to play No. 2 UCLA on Sunday.
Texas started the 2005-06 season 8-0. That team shared the Big 12 title and advanced to the regional final of the NCAA tournament.
To take it back much farther, Texas has won its first six games by at least 15 points, the first time the Longhorns have done that since 1915-16.
D.J. Augustin added 20 points for the Longhorns, who turned 24 turnovers by Texas Southern (1-5) into 34 points.
Kevin Abanobi and Anthony Ike both scored 15 points for Texas Southern, which hit 12 3-pointers.
Texas, which shot 64 percent in beating No. 11 Tennessee on a neutral court last week, fell far off that pace back home, shooting 41 percent in the first half against the Tigers. A.J. Abrams, who came in averaging 22.8 points, was 2-for-8 in the first half, including 1-for-7 on 3-pointers, his specialty.
Texas Southern kept it close in the first half with 3-pointers. Spotty Texas defense left shooters wide open on several occasions and the Tigers got good bounces on a couple of others that just beat the shot clock.
Texas stretched an early lead to 32-20 with a 14-2 run keyed by a 3-pointer from Abrams and consecutive baskets by Justin Mason. But the Tigers closed the half with consecutive 3-pointers by Abanobi, Raymond Robinson and Ike to pull within 39-32.
Another Texas breakdown left Abanobi wide open to start the second half and he swished his fourth 3-pointer to quickly cut the Texas lead to four. But that was about it for the Tigers.
Augustin answered Abanobi's basket with a 3 and Mason hit two free throws after a steal and Texas Southern's Matt Miller was whistled for an intentional foul. Abrams and Augustin hit layups and the nine-point swing put the Longhorns ahead 48-35.
The game quickly turned into a rout. Texas led 60-45 when James and Mason combined for 10 straight points to blow it wide open, stretching the lead to 70-45 with just under 10 minutes left.
POSTGAME NOTES
TEAM
- Texas started the season with six consecutive wins by margins of 15 points or more for just the second time in school history and the first time since the 1915-16 season
- Texas has averaged 99.3 points over the last four games
- Texas won six consecutive games by margins of 15 points or more for the first time since the 1993-94 season (Jan. 29, 1996 to Feb. 15, 1994)
- Texas is 77-7 (.917) against in-state foe during the Rick Barnes era
- Texas is 2-0 all-time against Texas Southern
- Texas is 5-0 all-time against current members of the Southwestern Athletic Conference
- Texas is 78-5 (.940) at home over the last six seasons
- Texas is 125-17 (.880) at the Erwin Center under Coach Barnes
- Texas is 103-9 (.920) in home games against unranked opponents during the Rick Barnes era
- Texas is 64-6 (.914) in non-conference home games during the Rick Barnes era
- Texas is off to a 6-0 start to the season for the second time in the last three seasons
- Texas shot .500 or better from the field for the fifth consecutive game
A.J. Abrams
- Made a three-point field goal for the 44th consecutive game
- Made multiple three-point field goals for the 17th consecutive game
- Scored 10 or more points for the 44th time in 78 career games, including 35 of the last 41
Connor Atchley
- Registered a career-high three assists. He had previously logged two assists in a game on six separate occasions
D.J. Augustin
- Has averaged 22.7 points over the last three games
- Scored 10 or more points for the fifth time in 2007-08 and the 30th time in 41 career games
- Made four or more three-point field goals for the second consecutive game, going a combined 8-of-14 against Tennessee and Texas Southern
- Scored 20 or more points for the third time in 2007-08 and the 10th time in his career
- Equaled a career-high four steals. He had previously registered four steals on six occasions, including earlier this season against New Mexico State
Damion James
- Registered a career-high with four assists. He had previously logged three assists on three occasions, including earlier this season against New Mexico State
- Registered a career-high with eight field goals. He had previously made seven field goals in a game on two occasions
- Recorded a double-double for the first time in 2007-08 and the fifth time in 41 career games
- Scored 10 or more points for the third time in 2007-08 and the 15th time in his career
- Logged 10 or more rebounds for the second time in 2007-08 and the 11th time in his career
Justin Mason
- Equaled a career high with seven field goals. He had previously made seven field goals on three occasions
- Scored 10 or more points in a game for the fourth time in 2007-08 and the 15th time in 41 career games
Harrison Smith
- Equaled a career-high with three rebounds. He had previously grabbed three caroms against Texas Southern last season.
TEXAS POSTGAME QUOTES
Rick Barnes, HEAD COACH
On the second half adjustments: I think that Texas Southern was obviously making some shots and taking the clock down, but we missed a lot of open shots. The thing that I talked at half time more than anything were the close shots that we rushed, but I didn't have a problem with us speeding the tempo up. We got lost a few times with switching and those types of things, but we missed a lot of shots and that was part of it. But honestly, I felt that over time, our size would wear them down and that happened. Damion James and Justin Mason were really terrific and they played really hard.
On playing UCLA this Sunday: We're going to find out Sunday night a lot about our basketball team. What I've seen up to this point, I think that UCLA is the best team in college basketball. I think they are a very talented team, a very well-coached basketball team and a team that really defends. They are not going to beat themselves. They've got the inside game, a mid-range game and a perimeter game. They have really good size. They're a team that's been to two straight final fours and I think they are playing really good basketball right now, minus a couple of guys. I don't know if there is a better team than you can see right now that we're going to see Sunday night.
On the first half: I just think we missed a lot of shots. A.J. [Abrams] had more looks tonight but he ends up 2-of-10 in shooting threes. I'm not sure he took one bad one. You look at the seven turnovers, and two of them came at the end. But they made some shots and they made some pretty good threes because they were 12-of-27. I like the effort of our guys.Damion James, SOPHOMORE FORWARD
On thinking ahead to the UCLA game: We take it one game at a time. After we beat Tennessee, of course we're looking towards UCLA, but we had [to play] TSU tonight. Now that we won, we're going to get ready for Sunday.
On his play against Texas Southern: It really wasn't about me, because if it wasn't for D.J. [Augustin], Justin [Mason], and A.J. [Abrams] getting me the ball, I couldn't have done what I did. I really came out with high energy, played defense and rebounded, and I let my offense take care of itself.
Justin Mason, SOPHOMORE GUARD
On Texas' energy in the second half: I think we played with more energy in the second half. We may have come out thinking the game would be a little bit slower, but we made the good halftime adjustment and came out ready to play. Our offense was working for us, so we wanted to pick it up on the defensive end and not give them too many open shots.
On Texas Southern's tenacity: They were hitting a lot of shots and really catching us off guard. Once they cut the lead to single digits we had to really pick it up.
