The Texas program has long been known for its defense. Under head coach Rick Barnes, the philosophy shifted from the run-n-gun style of Tom Penders to a well-disciplined, defense-first approach. It seems only fitting the the Longhorns put up their best defensive performance of the year on a night where Coach Barnes earned his 500th career win.

Texas cruised to an 84-50 victory over the Sam Houston State Bearkats in a game where the outcome was never in doubt. Both teams played an extremely sloppy first half, with 23 combined turnovers between the two teams. The Longhorns held SHSU to just a 29.2% success rate from the field, while posting an impressive 55% field-goal percentage of their own.

What looked good

The game was so one-sided on Tuesday night that it’s tough to extract any meaningful bits of information from the game. Was Texas really that good, or did the new-look Bearkats simply lay an egg in their first true test of the year?

The truth is likely found somewhere in the middle of those two extremes, but the raw numbers certainly look pretty. The Longhorns had an offensive efficiency of 1.14 points per possession, but the stats were even better on defense. Texas allowed the Bearkats just 0.68 points each trip down the floor, making it the team’s second-most efficient defensive performance since giving up 0.66 points per possession to Navy in the season opener.

On offense, the Longhorns were led by Jordan Hamilton, who matched his season average with 25 points despite only having to play 27 minutes in the blowout. He hit both of his three-point attempts on the night, was 5-of-6 at the stripe, and finished just a rebound shy of a double-double.

There is now no question that Hamilton will be the team’s leader this year, and it’s clear that he has matured during the offseason. After forcing up some bad shots in the pair of New York City games, Hamilton played smart, team basketball against Sam Houston State.

Surprisingly, the team’s second-leading scorer was senior point guard Dogus Balbay. The Turkish guard’s lack of a jump shot is an oft-noted deficiency, and he did miss the only short jumper he took against the Bearkats. But Balbay looked comfortable pushing the break, probing the interior D in half-court sets, and getting to the rim for easy layups.

His 14 points marked a new career-high, besting the 13 he posted against Texas Tech in January. Critics might point to the quality of those two opponents before giving Balbay credit, but the fact that he is once again looking to get to the rim will only serve to open up the rest of the offense.

Freshman Cory Joseph also had the best game of his young career, chipping in nine points on the night. Joseph led the team with four assists and managed to finish with just two turnovers in a game where it seemed like the Longhorns threw it away on every other possession. Cory has taken flak for the way the Pitt game finished, but he and Balbay are going to provide a dose of quality backcourt leadership this year. And we all know the adage about March and a team’s backcourt play…

The biggest subplot of the night, however, came at the free-throw line. The Longhorns finished 15-of-19 from the stripe, an improvement of a full 11 percentage points over the season average. Texas actually started their impressive free-throw streak during crunch time of the Pitt game, where they made eight out of 10 attempts over the final eight minutes of the game. Combining the numbers from those two games gives the Horns a 79.3% mark at the line over the last 48 minutes of basketball.

What needed work

For once, Tristan Thompson looked human. After making a huge splash in his first four games, including an absolutely incredible performance on back-to-back nights in New York, the freshman came back to Earth. Sam Houston State’s Antuan Bootle frustrated Thompson all night, limiting the Canadian to just three points and four boards in 28 minutes of play. He never seemed to get in the flow of the game, and with the outcome clearly in hand, Coach Barnes elected to give Matt Hill and Alexis Wangmene more minutes and experience.

The biggest flaw for Texas, though, was clearly the turnovers. While Texas turned things around at half and only coughed it up twice in the final 20 minutes, the first half was a disaster. The Longhorns had 12 miscues before halftime, and most of them were unforced errors. The team threw the ball into the crowd on multiple occasions, while J’Covan Brown and Gary Johnson combined to pick up five offensive fouls in the game. Considering the sloppy play was limited to just the first half, and that the team also had just ten turnovers in the entire game against Illinois, we figure it’s safe to chalk this one up as an aberration.

The other concern worth noting is the team’s continued struggles from three-point range. The Longhorns shot 30% from behind the arc last night, a sad number that is even more depressing if you were to remove Hamilton’s 2-for-2 performance. On the season, the team is 29.4% from long range. Take Hamilton and walk-on Dean Melchionni out of the equation — since Melchionni won’t see meaningful minutes this season — and the Longhorns are just 6-of-38 from three-point range, which is only a 15.8% success rate. Jai Lucas, who was the team’s best three-point shooter last season (46.2%) in his limited minutes, has yet to make one this year in his eight attempts.

Next up: vs. Rice Owls (3-2); Saturday, 3 P.M. CT