The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
University of Texas
3-0
Lipscomb
2-2
Men's Basketball defeats Lipcomb, 80-57
11.18.2017 | Men's Basketball
Junior Kerwin Roach II led the Longhorns with 16 points.
AUSTIN, Texas – Junior guard Kerwin Roach II netted a team-high 16 points as Texas Men's Basketball (3-0) picked up an 80-57 win over Lipscomb (2-2) at the Frank Erwin Center on Saturday evening.
Roach was 7-8 from the field in 24 minutes of play for the Longhorns. Freshman forward Mohamed Bamba recorded his first collegiate double-double with 13 points and 10 rebounds to go along with a game-high 5 blocks in just 19 minutes, while freshman guard Matt Coleman also reached double figures in scoring with 10 points.
As a team, the Longhorns shot 50.7 percent (29-57) from the field and held Lipscomb to 29.3 percent (17-58), well below its season average (40 percent). Texas outscored Lipscomb in the paint 44-30, forced 17 Bisons turnovers, and forced LU into just 2-23 (8.7 percent) shooting from behind the arc.
Texas scored the first six points of the game and held an early 11-8 lead after freshman Jericho Sims connected on a layup and was fouled with 14:36 remaining in the half.
Lipscomb scored the next four points and took a 12-11 lead with 11:21 to go in the opening half. UT answered with a 25-10 run to end the first, allowing just one field goal during the 10-minute span. Texas headed into the break with a 36-22 lead after a Roach layup with 41 seconds left.
Roach led Texas in the first half with 13 points on 6-7 shooting from the field. Bamba contributed seven points, adding five rebounds and four blocks. UT held Lipscomb to just 28 percent shooting (7-25) from the field and 0-9 from three. The Texas defense turned the Bisons over nine times and didn't allow an assist during the opening half.
The Longhorns continued to extend their advantage to open the second period. Bamba and freshman guard Jase Febres dialed up a pair of three-pointers, as Texas opened a 20-point (48-28) lead, using a 12-4 run in the opening five minutes.
Texas extended the lead to as many as 30 points (71-41) after sophomore Andrew Jones converted a traditional three-point play with 6:30 to go. Senior walk-on Ryan McClurg finished the scoring for the Longhorns after a trip to the charity stripe in the final 20 seconds, giving Texas the 80-57 victory.
Garrison Matthews led Lipscomb with 17 points.
The Longhorns will travel to Portland, Ore. for the PK80-Phil Knight Invitational and face Butler in the opening round on Thursday, Nov. 23. Tip is set for 6 p.m. CT at Veterans Memorial Coliseum, and the game will be nationally televised on ESPN2.
Texas Basketball Postgame Notes
Texas 80, Lipscomb 57
November 18, 2017
Frank Erwin Center (Austin, Texas)
Attendance: 8,592
Team Notes
- The Longhorns improved to 2-0 in the all-time series against Lipscomb. Both meetings have come in Austin.
- UT improved to 490-119 all-time in home games at the Frank Erwin Center. The Horns improved to 218-36 at the Erwin Center in the last 16 seasons (since start of the 2002-03 season). Texas improved to 27-10 at home in the Shaka Smart era.
- The Longhorns held Lipscomb to 57 points on 29.3% FG shooting (17-58), including an 8.7% (2-23) mark from 3-point range. Lipscomb registered 3 assists against 17 turnovers on the night.
- Texas held Lipscomb to 22 points on 28.0% FG shooting (7-25), including an 0-9 mark from 3-point range, in the first half. Lipscomb recorded 0 assists against 9 turnovers in the opening 20 minutes.
- The Longhorns recorded a 44-30 advantage in points in the paint.
Mohamed Bamba
- Recorded his first collegiate double-double (13 points, 10 rebounds) in just 19 minutes of action.
- Also registered a game-high 5 blocked shots, just 2 shy of the UT freshman single-game record (7, three times, last by Tristan Thompson vs. Oakland on March 18, 2011)
- Reached double figures in scoring for the second time this season (2 games)
- Reached double figures in rebounding for the first time this year
Matt Coleman
- Reached double figures in scoring (10 points) for the second time this season (3 games).
Kerwin Roach II
- Reached double figures in scoring (team-high 16 points) for the third time this season (3 games) and 29th time in his career (68 games)
- Converted 7-8 field goals and 2-3 free throws in a team-high 24 minutes
POSTGAME QUOTES
TEXAS
Head Coach Shaka Smart
On the defensive strategy for the game: Our biggest emphasis for the whole game was to not let them make threes. Our guys did a good job of that. They only got nine three-point shots off in the first half. You have to shoot a three to make a three. To be able to hold them to nine attempts and to force nine misses was really good. I have to watch the tape, but I think almost all of them were highly contested. Obviously, when that's a huge emphasis it can allow for drives to the basket, but I thought we did a good job protecting the basket. They got a couple of early shots on post-ups. Our plan when the ball went into the post was to play 1-on-1 defense and keep the other four guys locked in on their shooters. [Rob] Marberry is a good player. We knew he'd get a couple of buckets, but we didn't think they would be able to beat us with just those. We thought that they would need threes. I'm happy with the way our guys held them to two makes.
On the team's response to the chippy nature of the game: I told Eli Pepper after the game that I would have talked trash after that dunk too. It was impressive. The good thing about stuff like that is that it gets the energy going both ways. They certainly gained some energy from that, but our guys did too. When we play a team like Lipscomb, that our guys may not be as familiar with, we try to tell them that those guys are good players, too. Those are guys that can make plays. When Pepper had that dunk it was like, "there you go guys. I told you he's a good player." I thought our guys did a nice job of bringing energy back to counteract them. There was some trash talking back and forth. Mo [Bamba] got the technical. We obviously need to stay focused on the mission at hand.
Freshman forward Mohamed Bamba
On Kerwin's defense: Kerwin won't say this, but he's really stepped up for us defensively. It doesn't show up on the stat sheet, but what he's done for us defensively is really big. He can take out one of the nation's top leading scorers at the D1 level. His defense elevates my mind and empowers the entire team.
On Lipscomb: I'm not surprised at how well they played. Lipscomb is a very good team. We've watched a whole ton of their film and we knew what to expect. We knew that they're really good shooters and can play very well.
On next week's game at Portland: One thing we focused on going into this game is to not overlook their ability to play. Next week, when we're on the road, we need to kick it up a notch and need to lock in what we did tonight defensively.
Junior guard Kerwin Roach II
On future improvement: I feel like we can get better offensively and defensively. Offensively, we have to take care of the ball more. Today we had way more turnovers than assists. We also need to execute more. We did pretty well defensively, but we can always get better at it.
On improving their 3-point shot: We just need to practice more in the gym. That's honestly the only remedy to fixing our shots. We need to get more reps up and knock down more shots.
On being under the spotlight: We have to keep level-headed. The team's mindset is completely different this year and we will continue to go into each game ready to compete.
LIPSCOMB
Head Coach Casey Alexander
Opening statement: If I told you that we were a good offensive team, you probably wouldn't believe me. We're supposed to be when we're good. Honestly, Texas deserves a ton of credit for making things very difficult for us, but anytime we go 2-for-23 (three-point shots), we're going to have a hard time winning games. But they were really good, obviously made it very difficult. It's just turnovers too, as we were top-20 in the country in threes made and attempted per-game last year. We were also top-10 in the country in assists per game. So if you look at those two numbers on the stat sheet, we were obviously unseen tonight.
On Texas' defense: We've got some guys that need to play better, but they were really solid and they didn't really give us anything. Offensively, we didn't really get a chance to get any easy baskets. Garrison Mathews is averaging 25 a game in the first three games, and he doesn't play in the first half with foul trouble. That was a big part of it, too.
On dealing with Bamba: He's super long, a super talented player. Got a bright future, obviously. We were aggressive early in the first 10 minutes. We drove their long closeouts, and we got the ball in the paint. We actually scored it a time or two, but that's a bad formula for success over the long haul. We're just not used to seeing that length at all.
On preparing for Bamba: I think that we were prepared, but as far as what we had seen, it's just an adjustment when you're playing the game. We play 25 games against people at our level and we play three or four games against people at this level, so until you're out there doing it, it's hard to really be ready for.
