Texas tickled to gig Jayhawks
Dallas ? Eleven players average more than 11 minutes on the floor per game. That’s men’s basketball at the University of Texas.
The Longhorns don’t shoot so good. They’re not great rebounders. And they sometimes suffer from fits of turnovers.
But they play defense all the time every time, and the Texas style of basketball was never more evident than in Saturday’s 64-60 win over Kansas University in the semifinals of the Big 12 Conference tournament at American Airlines Center.
“We did the little things, we stayed together, we did what we do,” UT senior guard Royal Ivey said. “That’s Texas basketball.”
Somebody always seems to step up for the Longhorns.
Ivey, for instance, may have produced Saturday’s most decisive goal — an easy basket underneath by Jason Klotz with 1:02 remaining. At the time, Texas led by just two points, and the shot clock was running down.
Ivey drove toward the basket, and as KU’s Jeff Graves left Klotz to impede Ivey’s progress, Ivey slipped the ball around Graves right into Klotz’s mitts.
“I made eye contact with Royal,” said Klotz, who finished with 14 points and eight rebounds, “and he’s really good at wrapping the ball around a defender.”
Texas was able to overcome a dreadful start in order to advance to today’s 2 p.m. tourney championship contest against Oklahoma State. The Longhorns missed 10 of their first 11 shots and were trailing 13-2 before the lights went on.
Texas coach Rick Barnes argues for a foul in the first half. UT was called for 22 fouls to Kansas' 17.
“We got our feet under us, and we finally started making some shots,” Ivey said. “We got in our groove, and that was the game.”
That may be oversimplifying, because the ‘Horns’ groove doesn’t usually contain the zone and zone press UT coach Rick Barnes sprung a couple of times on the Jayhawks.
“Defensively, we got a lot of great effort when we went to the zone,” Barnes said. “Basically, though, we had to make some plays, and our players made them.”
Ivey didn’t salivate when Barnes ordered his players into a zone, but he was loving it nonetheless.
“I think it’s great,” the veteran guard said with a smile. “Defense is what I do, and with our depth we can create problems. It’s been great. We need to keep doing that.”
Barnes wasn’t saying if he planned to zone the Cowboys today, but with Oklahoma State’s vaunted outside shooting, it’s more likely Barnes will stick mostly with man-to-man.
Anyhow, Barnes was more concerned about his offense.
“It’s going to get down to taking care of the ball,” the UT coach said after his players were guilty of only seven turnovers against Kansas. “We made great improvement in that department today.”
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