Visit to Allen Fieldhouse could be last for a while
AUSTIN — When Rodney Terry reflects on Texas’ history at Kansas, he thinks about how T.J. Ford and Kevin Durant almost beat the Jayhawks at Allen Fieldhouse.
Ford had 25 points, 10 rebounds and seven assists against Kansas in 2003, but Texas fell short 90-87. A missed buzzerbeating 3-pointer would have sent the game to overtime.
“We felt like we should’ve won but they had a good team, too,” Terry said. “They were a Final Four team that year as well.”
In Texas’ last regularseason game of the 2007 season, Kevin Durant dropped 32 points with nine rebounds and four steals. The Longhorns lost 90-86.
“They threw pros at him and they couldn’t really guard him,” Terry said. “The crowd was in awe. They were in awe of his performance in that building. We came up a little short and ended up losing the Big 12 regular-season championship in that game.”
But not all of Terry’s memories at Allen Fieldhouse are bad ones. He also remembers going to The Phog back in January 2011 with Tristan Thompson and Cory Joseph, both freshmen starters at the time, and having to overcome an initial 13-2 deficit. The Longhorns trailed by as many as 15 points.
“I said, ‘Coach, you want to call timeout?’ ” Terry recalled asking thenTexas head coach Rick Barnes.
“No, let them figure it out,” Barnes said to Terry, an assistant coach at the time.
The Longhorns did eventually figure it out, defeating the Jayhawks 74-63 for their first-ever win at The Phog.
Thirteen years later, Terry has the chance as Texas’ head coach to lead the Longhorns to a win in what could be its last appearance at Allen Fieldhouse for the foreseeable future.
The Longhorns (17-9, 6-7 Big 12) will face off against the No. 9 Kansas Jayhawks (20-6, 8-5 Big 12) in Lawrence, Kan., on Saturday evening at 5 p.m.
Texas clearly has another big challenge ahead against one of college basketball’s top teams. Saturday’s game will be the Longhorns’ fifth-straight ranked road matchup in conference play.
“There’s no easy venues to play in this league,” Terry said. “We haven’t been to a venue yet where it wasn’t sold out. But that makes a great league.”
Kansas’ leading scorer is guard Kevin McCullar, who is averaging 19 points per game. However, McCullar’s status for Saturday’s game is uncertain. But the Jayhawks have other offensive weapons in center Hunter Dickinson and forward K.J. Adams Jr., who also happens to be an Austin local. The Jayhawks’ leader in assists and steals, guard Dajuan Harris, was last year’s Big 12 Defensive Player of the Year and was one of Kansas’ starters in the 2022 national title game.
“Anytime you have a guy that’s started in the national championship game and won a national championship, you’re gonna have a chance every year to be the favorite to win the league,” Terry said.
As for the future of the Texas and Kansas series, Terry says that he has spoken to Kansas head coach Bill Self about potentially organizing future games after Texas heads to the SEC.
But it does not appear that another trip to Allen Fieldhouse past Saturday is imminent.
“I talked to coach Self this summer a little bit about it, you know, about continuing to play. (We) didn’t really talk about home and home,” Terry said with a hearty laugh. “We talked about a neutral site (and) a neutral site. We play all the time over in Kansas City in the conference tournament. We’d love to bring them back around here in central Texas.”