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Game Recap
Tortilla Tossin’ Player of the Game: Can I give this to Davide Moretti and Brandone Francis? Moretti continues to do well in conference play as he had 13 points on just 3 of 4 from the field, including 6 of 7 from the line, 3 boards, 2 assists, 3 steals, and 3 turnovers. Francis looked good out there for the first time in a while, scoring 14 points on 4 of 8, including 3 of 4 from beyond the three-point line, 2 rebounds, and 1 turnover.
Defender of the Game: I don’t know how to pick this, I can go with Moretti with his 3 steals?
Multi-Purpose Player of the Game: I’ll go with Culver here, but I have higher expectations which are kinda unfair, Culver had 19 points on 9 of 16 from the floor, 9 boards, 5 assists, 3 steals, and those 7 dreadful turnovers.
Game Notes:
- I don’t have a ton to write after this game and I think I may need to be in a similar mood for Kansas State in Manhattan on Tuesday. That’s going to be more difficult than this game and K-State is at full strength.
- If you watched the game, you know that it was a game where Texas Tech got out early, then Baylor just decided to shoot a ton of three-pointers, which paid off early, and then, in the second half, Baylor was just better and Texas Tech wasn’t.
- Texas Tech certainly didn’t help themselves, with 17 turnovers, led by 7 from Jarrett Culver. He’s clearly the best player on the team, but he’s had a turnover problem in recent games. Culver had 5 against Iowa State, 4 against Texas, 4 against Oklahoma, and he had 6 against Duke. Culver is a high usage player, he has the ball in his hands quite a bit, but he’s got to take care of possessions. I’ve harped on this with Matt Mooney as well this year, his turnover numbers are too high, in fact, he’s 50/50 on the year assists to turnovers.
- One other note on the turnovers is that Baylor scored 72 points, which is much higher than the season averaged allowed, which is 55 or show points per game. When you turn the ball over 17 times, that’s 17 extra possessions for the opposing team to be better than you offensively. So, if you’re struggling offensively and you give the other offense 17 extra possessions to be better than you, then your defense AND offense are going to be worse off as a result.
- In the second half, Baylor was more aggressive, they had 16 free throw attempts, Texas Tech had 15 personal fouls called on them, compared to just 7 free throw attempts for Texas Tech and 7 personal fouls. I don’t write about home-cooking, I’ll leave that to you all, but with a gap that wide in terms of numbers, that’s not a referee problem, that’s an aggressiveness problem. And Jarrett Culver didn’t have a free throw attempt for the entire game. That’s got to change.
- In the second half, it was the turnovers, 9, and the lack of aggression, 7 free throw attempts, that did this team in. Texas Tech is going to have to figure some things out and that’s okay.
- One of the best things about Chris Beard is that he’s pretty consistent despite what you saw on the court yesterday and I think he’ll get things straightened out. It’s been a fun ride this year, but this team isn’t as talented as last year’s team, in part because the offense isn’t even close to being as good and that’s okay. I think generally this team is a better defensive team, but this team is falling back to earth a bit after a meteoric rise. Not only that, but the Big 12 isn’t easy, Kansas, arguably the best team in the nation loses to West Virginia, the worst team in the Big 12, on the road. This is a thing that happens in conference play, not just in the Big 12.
- Head coach Chris Beard:
“We had too many turnovers,” Texas Tech coach Chris Beard said. “It was like we were just going down the court and handing the ball over to Baylor. Today they beat us with the 3-point shot, we turned the ball over too much and they out-rebounded us. You just can’t hand the ball to the other team 17 times and expect to win on the road against a really good coach and a really good team.”
/snip/
“We are just going to continue to fight and scrap,” Beard said. “These games are tough to win. Today I’m just disappointed. I thought we beat ourselves in a lot of ways.”
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