The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
University of Texas
13-6,5-2Big 12
Oklahoma State
12-7,3-4Big 12
Fourth-quarter rally propels Women's Basketball to 61-56 win over OSU
01.25.2020 | Women's Basketball
Down by six, Longhorns outscore Cowgirls by 13-2 at the end.
STILLWATER, Okla. – Down by six points with six minutes left in the game, Texas went on a 10-0 run, and then played shutdown defense in the last two minutes to defeat Oklahoma State, 61-56, in a Big 12 Conference game on Saturday afternoon at Gallagher-Iba Arena.
Trailing 54-48 with 6:03 on the clock, the Longhorns got a layup by Celeste Taylor, a three pointer by Charli Collier, another layup and free throw by Taylor, and two more points at the line by Sug Sutton – taking a four-point lead at the 2:26 mark. After OSU closed the margin to two points, a layup by Joyner Holmes and Taylor's free throw cemented the victory for Texas.
After leading the game for all but 16 seconds through three quarters, the Cowgirls (12-7, 3-4) saw the Longhorns (13-6, 5-2) mount a 13-2 rally at the end. Texas made 14 of 17 free throws while Oklahoma State missed on its only trip to the charity stripe.
Texas held Oklahoma State to six points in the fourth quarter.
Collier scored 14, Taylor 13 and Sutton 12 for UT. Vivian Gray led all scorers with 24 points for OSU.
Collier hit a trio of three pointers to keep Texas competitive in an otherwise cold-shooting first quarter, as the Longhorns hit only two of their first 12 shots and recorded a 29 percent field goal shooting percentage. OSU led, 18-15, at the end of the first period.
Texas' shooting woes persisted in the second quarter, as the Longhorns hit 24 percent of their shots in the period and 27 percent for the half. Defense kept UT in the game, forcing 10 Cowgirl turnovers in the second quarter. During the first half, UT scored 13 of its points off of OSU turnovers. OSU led, 28-25 at halftime. Collier led the Horns with 11 points.
After Texas tied the game twice early in the third quarter, OSU opened up an eight-point lead on three occasions, including a 50-42 margin at the end of the penultimate period.
Texas began the final quarter with a 6-0 run on two layups by Sutton and one by Taylor. OSU reestablished a six-point lead, only to fall to the Longhorns' dramatic rally.
KEY STATISTICS
- The Longhorns started Taylor, Collier, Sutton, Holmes and Jada Underwood.
- Texas leads the all-time series with Oklahoma State, 37-15.
- Texas led the game for 3:19. OSU led for 33:24 and the score was tied for 2:58.
- Texas scored 24 points off of Oklahoma State turnovers.
- Texas won the rebounding battle, 40-38.
- Texas shot 33 percent from the floor. Oklahoma State shot 44 percent.
TEXAS HEAD COACH KAREN ASTON
"Congratulations to Coach [Jim] Littell for 800 wins. What a phenomenal career. They played well today.
"I thought that we struggled for the majority of the game. Just finishing around the rim – I don't know if we were anticipating all of the shot blocking because they obviously lead the league in blocking shots. Some of their shot blockers weren't there, and perhaps we spent too much time talking about that. We missed a lot of bunnies and I thought that affected our confidence in the game. But we did what we had to do defensively to win down the stretch. I thought we did a better job on [Vivian] Gray and then made the plays we had to make what I considered to be an ugly game for us.
"I really thought our bench won the game for us. They gave us plays when the others were either struggling or in foul trouble. They kept us in it. What got us over the hump was Celeste getting back into the game, because she has a lot of defensive energy. Late in the game, I thought Joyner reset herself and gave us the ability to switch some screens between Joyner and our guards on Vivian Gray. We got over ourselves somewhat and were able to lock in."
UP NEXT
Texas continues its road trip at Oklahoma on Tuesday night. Tip-off at Lloyd Noble Arena is slated for 7 p.m. CT and the game will be televised by Fox Sports Oklahoma. The game will be available on radio at 105.3 FM in Austin and online at TexasSports.com/audio.
