Coming into Wednesday night’s showdown with North Carolina, it was clear that the Longhorns had a very tough match-up on their hands. The Tar Heels had the size advantage at every position, much more experience, a roster full of future NBA players, and a rowdy home crowd of nearly 22,000 thirsty for revenge.
The Tar Heels had a lot to celebrate on Wednesday night Even with that deck of cards stacked against the Longhorns, it was tough to see this kind of destruction coming. A seven-minute field goal drought in the first half put Texas in a big hole, and North Carolina just kept shoveling more dirt on top of them. The Tar Heels built a lead as big as 24 points in the second half, toying with the Longhorns all night as they repeatedly added footage to the team highlight reel, cruising to an 82-63 win. What looked good In a game as one-sided as this, it can be tough to find the bright spots. Coach Rick Barnes was frustrated from the opening tip, as the Longhorns failed to even run their scripted first play correctly. Regardless, there were still some brief moments of success, giving fans something to take away from the beating. Although the Longhorns gave up 42 points in the paint, they actually did remarkably good defensive work on Carolina big man Tyler Zeller in post-up situations. Alexis Wangmene and Clint Chapman held him to 2-of-7 shooting in the first half and 3-of-11 overall. When the Longhorns didn’t completely lose Zeller in the half-court, his offense was mostly limited to turnaround jumpers and his trademark hook shot, which simply wasn’t falling last night. Texas also turned in a good effort on the offensive glass, but had very little to show for it. The Longhorns reclaimed 38.6% of their missed shots, a very good mark against a sizable Carolina squad that has only allowed opponents a 30.5% offensive rebounding percentage this season. Unfortunately, Texas shot just 13-of-31 from the paint, missing far too many easy ones. Freshman Jaylen Bond was a big reason why the Longhorns were able to succeed on the offensive glass, as he put in his third-straight solid effort off the bench. Bond grabbed 22.7% of his offensive rebounding opportunities, pushing his season mark up to 13.7%, sixth-best in the Big 12, and just outside of the Top 100 nationally. In his last three games, Jaylen has grabbed 29 total boards while averaging just over 20 minutes per game. One can only hope that his relentless work on the glass will translate into even more playing time as conference play begins. What needed work While there were a few bright spots, there were far too many problem areas that could be addressed. Rather than try to beat Tolstoy in a word-count battle, we’ll focus on some of the most egregious ones. As previously mentioned, the Longhorns were incredibly ineffective in the paint, only turning their extended possessions into more missed shots. For all of the good things Chapman had done defensively, his ineptitude from within two feet was infuriating. His final line was 1-of-6 shooting, with all of those misses coming from within spitting distance of the rim. The Longhorns also did a terrible job protecting the basketball, a stat that is even more troubling considering how infrequently Carolina had turned its opponents over prior to this game. Texas gave it up 13 times, resulting in 17 Tar Heel points, but also had numerous bad bounces go against them. Time after time, Longhorn players bobbled loose balls or batted rebounds out of bounds or to the other team. If the Dean Dome weren’t so loud and bathed in powder blue, it would have felt like being in a Buster Keaton film. The worst results, however, came on the defensive glass. While the Longhorns did a great job defending Zeller in the post, it seemed like every one of his missed shots resulted in a weak-side rebound and putback. The Tar Heels grabbed 56.4% of their missed shots, a number that is practically unheard of. In fact, the 43.6% of the defensive rebounds that Texas did manage to grab added up to the worst performance for a Longhorn team in at least 12 years. Unfortunately, that’s as far back as the tempo-free stats at KenPom and Stat Sheet go, so there’s no telling just how historically awful that number actually is. Finally, Longhorn fans might also start worrying about the point guard situation. Myck Kabongo once again had a terrible start to the game, leading Coach Barnes to openly voice his frustrations with the freshman guard in the post-game presser. “We’re going to get guys in here that want to play,” the coach told the media. “I’ve been doing this a long time. I’ve never seen a guy who wouldn’t want to be in this atmosphere.” Kabongo was dealing with a bad back in this game, and his playing time was limited to an ineffective 15 minutes. There’s no telling how much of that was due to injury and how much was due to Barnes’ frustration. Fans have to hope it was the former, and that the injury can heal quickly. While Myck has started slowly in nearly every game, there’s no question that the Longhorn offense is infinitely better when he’s on the floor and clicking.
North Carolina’s traps stifled Sterling Gibbs With Kabongo on the bench for a majority of the game, Texas handed the reins to freshman guard Sterling Gibbs. While he has proven himself to be mostly serviceable as the backup point, Gibbs still has major issues with any hard traps. Carolina took advantage of this on a few second half possessions, bull-rushing the guard with two lengthy bigs well beyond the perimeter. By the time conference play starts on January 4th, opponents will have picked up on this fact and are sure to put added pressure on Gibbs when he’s running the point. The big picture In the grand scheme of things, this doesn’t change much. While the game was tough to watch and the result was more lopsided than some may have expected, only the certifiably insane believed that such a young Texas team had a strong chance to knock off this Carolina team on the road. The Longhorns will likely enter conference play at 10-3, as only Rice remains on the non-con docket. Twenty wins is often pointed to as a magic number for making the NCAA field, but Texas lacks quality victories in their non-league slate. Last weekend’s win over Temple will hold weight, but outside of that, the Horns can only hang their hat on a road win against a UCLA team that was unraveling at the time. Texas is going to have to defend its home court once Big 12 play begins, stealing a few wins against the likes of Baylor, Kansas, Missouri, or A&M. The Big 12 is definitely down this year, so anything short of 10-8 in conference play could mean the end of the school’s 13-year NCAA tournament appearance streak. Up next: vs. Rice (7-4); 1 P.M., Saturday, Dec. 31st |
2 Responses to “Longhorns crumble at the Dean Dome”
on 22 Dec 2011 at 1:32 pm # Tim Jones
Great report as usual, Ryan. We really appreciate your insight.
on 22 Dec 2011 at 1:56 pm # GoofyTigre
I like the Tolstoy reference. I was also saying to a friend (Jud) that it was going to suck being on UNC’s highlight reel this much going forward through the year. Heh.
I agree that Bond was again a big player for us. He seemed to be everywhere when there was a rebound to be had. Unfortunately, I think we padded our rebounding stats by missing close shots and then the tip and then another tip in. Craig Way was screaming, as he usually does, every time we were near the rim. It would have been funny if it weren’t Texas. :-/
I also think that Brown needs to realize that he is not that tall, and he cannot have his shot blocked as many times as it has been this season. He tries to do a little more than he is capable of and it turns into bad decisions and/or turnovers/blocked shots or missed shots.
Other than that, I look forward to the conference games. I predicted 17 wins for us this year, and we’ll see if we can hit that mark or go a little better.
Thanks you Ryan, for putting this up every game. We appreciate it!