Longhorns determined to rebound from narrow loss
AUSTIN – Swish. Swish.
Swish.
About 45 minutes had elapsed since Texas Tech’s Mac McClung pulled up for a 22-foot dagger inside the Erwin Center, but Texas freshman Greg Brown was still in full uniform, still on the court. He remained stationary at the free-throw line as 11 p.m. neared, suffusing the empty arena with the pleasing sound of a composite leather ball caressing a polyester net.
Eventually, long after the bass-heavy beats and unrestrained roars from the visitor’s locker room faded, sophomore Kai Jones moseyed out the tunnel the check on his teammate. After a few more shots kissed net the pair strolled off together, finally ready to turn the page on a painful Wednesday night full of hard lessons.
“He was out there shooting free throws because he was 3-for-5 from the line and as a team we were 18for-31 and we lost a twopoint game,” Texas coach Shaka Smart said following his team’s 72-70 loss to No. 15 Texas Tech. “What’s great about him is he’s willing to internalize lessons and coaching and that’s why he’s going to keep getting better.”
Just four days earlier, No. 4 Texas (10-2, 4-1 Big 12) had been on the other side of this exact scenario. The Longhorns reveled in euphoria
after guard Andrew Jones knocked down a game-winning 3-pointer inside WVU Coliseum, lifting them over No. 14 West Virginia.
But Brown and the Longhorns couldn’t hold the 10point lead they took into halftime against Tech. Their offense stagnated. Their defensive and rebounding intensity waned. Their “juice,” the way Smart defines drive and energy, dried up.
Some eye-popping statistical tallies — a 19-0 disadvantage in points off turnovers, a 58.1 free-throw percentage,
a 9-to-15 assist-toturnover ratio — led Texas to lose both a winnable game and its spot alongside the top of the Big 12 alongside No. 2 Baylor (11-0, 4-0). But the Longhorns haven’t lost their connectivity ahead of a soft stretch that begins at home Saturday against Kansas State (5-8, 1-4) and continues with road games against TCU (9-5, 2-4) and Iowa State (2-7, 0-5).
“My teammates and I connect really well,” Brown said Friday during a Zoom availability. “We can talk about anything. We
can text each other about anything. I just feel like we’re a brotherhood, we’re one.”
That much has been apparent all season and was again in Wednesday’s aftermath.
While Jones came out to comfort Brown, senior point guard Matt Coleman stood behind junior guard Courtney Ramey as he fielded post-game questions about his critical inbounding turnover with 44 seconds left. It was a gesture of genuine affection from one team leader to another, the type of act that
speaks more to this group’s bond than a game’s outcome.
“I’d do the same for him. It just shows that we’re connected and we’re close. He was the reason I came to Texas. I talked to him and he allowed me to be his backcourt mate. He could’ve been like, ‘Nah, I want to run the show by myself.’ He allowed be to play alongside him, so I appreciate him for that.
“We’re a great team,” Ramey added. “And great teams lose sometimes. We just have to not let it carry over to the next game.”
Texas dealt with this sort of deflation back on Dec. 6, when a Final Four-caliber Villanova team walked out of the Erwin Center with a 68-64 win. That L sparked the Longhorns on a sixgame winning streak highlighted by an 85-59 smackdown of No. 3 Kansas at Allen Fieldhouse.
This team’s ability to rebound from letdowns, whether they be calamitous blowouts or whiteknuckled defeats, dates back to the end of last season. With a roster whittled down to eight and sometimes seven active players,
Texas crawled out of an early-February grave by winning five straight games to rocket back into NCAA Tournament contention.
And this version of the Longhorns is more connected, more talented and more determined than any of Smart’s previous squads. Even a seldom-used forward like junior Kamaka Hepa has carved out a role as a jumpy, direction-barking bench battery and hype man extraordinaire.
Though Hepa might need to crank it down from an 11 to a more modest 10 – he drew a technical foul late in the loss to Tech for scrambling around the sideline in disbelief after a 3-point shooting foul on junior wing Brock Cunningham – his devotion and support is another vital part of this team’s chemistry.
“(Smart) always talks about bench energy and juice level because that’s important for the game,” Brown said. “The bench gives us a lot of energy during the game, which means they’re locked in, we’re locked in and we’re communicating and connected.”
Texas will probably lose again before tournament time considering it still has two games remaining against Baylor and rematches with Kansas, Tech and WVU. But it won’t splinter.