The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
University of Texas
22-8, 11-6
TCU
9-20, 0-17
| Team | 1 | 2 | F |
|---|---|---|---|
| TCU | 27 | 27 | 54 |
| Texas | 36 | 30 | 66 |
Men's Basketball tops TCU, 66-54
03.05.2014 | Men's Basketball
Connor Lammert recorded his first career double-double with 10 points and a career-high 13 rebounds.
Box Score | Postgame Notes | Postgame Quotes | Photo Gallery
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) -- Isaiah Taylor scored 21 points and Texas beat TCU 66-54 Wednesday night, pushing the Horned Frogs closer to becoming just the third team in the history of the Big 12 to go winless in the regular season in conference play.
Cameron Ridley added 14 points and 10 rebounds for Texas (22-8, 11-6), which went 8-1 at home in the Big 12 in a resurgent season for coach Rick Barnes, whose only losing season at Texas was last year. It was Ridley's third consecutive double-double.
Kyan Anderson scored 28 for TCU (9-20, 0-17). The last Big 12 team to go winless in the league in the regular season was Texas A&M in 2003-2004.
The Longhorns played without leading scorer Jonathan Holmes, who missed the game because of recurring problems with a right knee injury. Texas did not announce a timetable for his return as the Longhorns end the regular season at Texas Tech on Saturday before the Big 12 tournament.
Connor Lammert also had a double-double for Texas with 10 points and 13 rebounds.
Texas controlled the first half behind 10 points each from Ridley and Taylor. Ridley nearly had a double-double by halftime as Texas built the lead as high as 18-5 in the early going. TCU went nearly six minutes without a field goal before Anderson brought the drought with a long jumper.
Anderson did everything he could to keep the Horned Frogs in the game. He scored TCU's first 14 points as his teammates missed their first nine shots. TCU rallied late in the half to pull within seven on a twisting reverse layup by Anderson before Taylor made two free throws give Texas a 36-27 halftime lead.
Anderson made a 3-pointer to open the second half before Taylor scored nine in a four-minute stretch that pushed Texas' lead as high as 13.
But Texas struggled to shake off the Horned Frogs for good. Anderson kept pushing the tempo when he could and TCU kept getting to the free throw line. TCU went 23 of 29 from the line and Anderson made two to get TCU within 55-49 before Martez Walker answered with a 3-pointer -- just the second of the game for the Longhorns. Texas was just 3 of 10 from long range.
Taylor picked up his fourth foul with six minutes to play, but Ridley scored four straight points to put Texas back up by 10 with 4:51 left.
POSTGAME NOTES
• Texas improves to 22-8 and 11-6 in Big 12 Conference play.
• The Longhorns finish 16-2 at home this season. The 16 victories are one shy of the school season-record for most home wins (17-1 in 2007-08) and ties for second most number of home wins in a season (16-1 in 2000-01, 16-1 in 2005-06, 16-2 in 2010-11).
• Texas improved to 104-62 all-time against TCU. The Horns have won nine straight meetings and 13 of the last 14 games. At home, the Horns are 61-19 against the Horned Frogs and 6-0 in the Rick Barnes era.
• The Horns outrebounded TCU 48-32 tonight. In the first meeting this year (Feb. 4), the Longhorns claimed a +31 rebound margin (56-25). For this year's two-game series, Texas owns a 104-57 (+47) advantage on the boards over TCU.
• Texas held TCU to a .194 (6-of-31 FG) shooting percentage from the field in the second half and a .259 (14-of-54 FG) percentage for the game, the lowest this season by a UT opponent. The Longhorns also held the Horned Frogs to only six field goals in the second half and 14 made field goals in the game, a season low by an opponent.
• The Horns are 18-0 when holding their opponent under 40 percent from the field.
• Texas shot 88.9 percent (16-of-18) from the line tonight.
• UT outscored TCU 30-14 in the paint. Over the last three games, the Horns have outscored their opponent 102-50 in the paint.
• Over the last three games, Holland is averaging 6.7 rebounds in 30.3 minutes per game.
• Recorded his first career double-double (10 points, 13 rebounds) in 64 career games.
• Recorded a career-high 13 rebounds. Reached double figures in rebounding for the second time this year and third time in his career.
• Reached double figures in scoring for the fifth time this season and eighth time in his career.
• Recorded his third consecutive double-double (14 points, 10 rebounds). It is his ninth of the season (sixth in Big 12 play) and 10th in his career (63 games)
• Reached double figures in scoring for the 18th time this season and 20th time in his career.
• His 69 blocks this season ranks No. 10 in the Texas single-season record book.
• Reached double figures in scoring (21 points) for the 24th time this year (30 games).
• Recorded his fourth 20-point performance of the season.
• Taylor has made his last 15 straight free throws spanning over the last three games.
• Over the last five games, Taylor is averaging 15.0 points, 6.0 assists and 5.0 rebounds in 32.2 mpg.
POSTGAME QUOTES
Texas Head Coach Rick Barnes
On Isaiah Taylor's improvements: Well, the hardest thing for a guy like Isaiah is, all through high school, people probably gave him some cushion, but some guys might come up and pressure him, some guys may back way off. The biggest problem he's had is being able to make that adjustment and understand what's going on. He has to make his adjustments. He's terrific on the baseline and I've told him that if he stands around the top of the key his man is just going to flatten it back in there, which affects a lot of things. He's a competitor and he's learned a lot of that. He can shoot the ball. Anybody that shoots what he does from the free throw line, his percentage, can shoot it, but he's never had to shoot it. That's where he has to change his mindset. He's had to change and adjust to a lot of different things and every game is a new experience for him.
On Jonathan Holmes hurting his knee against Oklahoma: Yeah, he did. He came down and winced. He went back in. He hasn't really practiced. He's worked on it. He's really tried hard to rehab it and get ready. He goes so hard. He's not going to pace it. He told the trainers he was feeling a little bit better tonight. I don't think he'll miss Saturday.
On having confidence that the team is building: What happened to us in the last couple of weeks is we've played the top three teams in the league. If you don't think winning basketball games are hard at home or on the road, Syracuse was 25-0 two and a half weeks ago, and they dropped because look who they've had to play. Tonight, Wake Forest beats Duke. Sometimes you try to overanalyze it but what you have to do is continue to coach your team and show them the mistakes they've made. You take the majority of our league and you put two teams out there, and both teams play perfect, it would be one or two possession games every night.
Freshman G Isaiah Taylor
On how he would describe this win: I think this was a good win for us coming off a loss at Oklahoma. We needed to get back on our feet and I think it was a good win at home for us.
On if he is thinking about the NCAA tournament: Playing in the NCAA tournament hasn't reached my mind yet. I'm just focused on the Big 12 tournament right now and, besides the Big 12 Tournament, our game in Lubbock this Saturday. We're trying to take it one game at a time and we're not looking past anybody.
Sophomore F Connor Lammert
On gaining momentum with this win: Unfortunately we've had to deal with Jon [Holmes] being out a game before. I knew my teammates would have confidence in me and I was just going to go out there and give it my all. The team isn't about one person. They were missing a big guy on their team today too. Going off of what Isaiah said about the NCAA tournament, it's not really in our minds but we know that we have to keep improving and, obviously, the next game on our schedule is the most important thing that we're focusing on. We're getting better and we know we're going to see some great teams in the NCAA tournament. So if we get better for the NCAA tournament it's going to help us get better for the next game.
On the excitement knowing they will return to the NCAA tournament this year: It's cool for us, but it's also where people that have been supporting Texas basketball expect us to be. I grew up watching Texas basketball when they were in the tournament and to get us back to it is a great thing for us and it's something we should be proud of. It's definitely not something we should take lightly. We need to be working every day in practice for that.
On what their recent road losses have taught them: We have faced some adversity and that's one thing that we just talked about in the locker room looking forward to Tech. We know it's going to be a great crowd there; we just have to handle adversity better and not make stupid turnovers. If we make stupid turnovers we're taking ourselves out of the game, just like we did in Oklahoma.
TCU Head Coach Trent Johnson
Opening statement: I thought the game was very similar to the one played in Fort Worth. They wore us down. I really like Rick's team, they are physical, they all play for each other, pound the ball inside, and distribute the ball evenly. It seems like no one is selfish on this team. They are a hard matchup for us like a lot of teams are. At times, we played frustrated when the ball did not go down for us. It is hard for them not to play frustrated as things haven't exactly bounced our way all year long. Kyan was key in this game, he has been playing well all year long. He has been playing hard offensively. He is doing a great job staying within the flow of what we want done because usually when you have the capability that he has, you can go off and do your own thing. He has done a really, really good job all year long, versus good teams and players. Texas is a good basketball team. They are going to be good for years to come.
On TCU's effort tonight: We have a lot of young guys, youth is an excuse but the bottom line is that Karviar is 1-13, though he had some good looks. Jarvis is playing well, he had his second double-double, every bit of 6-1 he is a pretty big four-man in this league. I cannot fault their efforts, I would have just liked to see us breakthrough here and have a chance to get a win. They are pretty resilient. They have been fighting all season long.
Junior G Kyan Anderson
On the importance of continuing to push through the season: It is very important especially with these guys in our situation. It is a pride thing at this point. We are trying to stay positive through the thick and thin. I have a lot of respect for those guys in the locker room, coaches included.
On the game plan coming into the game: We made it a key to try to bring out their bigs, we wanted them high and out of the paint. I felt as though we were successful in that. We got to the line a lot tonight. In both games against Texas this season, we did a good job of bringing Ridley and Ibeh out. That was the main key against a big physical, strong, fast team like Texas. We wanted to bring those guys out or put them in foul trouble, we did a good job of bringing them out.
On scouting the Texas guards: Taylor is pretty tough, I try to keep him out of the paint. I tried to keep him out of a rhythm, he has a good floater and one dribble pull-up. Felix, you have to get out the shooters, rather you are going man or zone you have to get rid of the shooters to stop transition buckets.
