TRENDING FOR TEXAS TECH
Turnovers | Our ranking is #12 in the nation for turnovers per game at 16.9. We have played four Big 12 conference games and average 15.2 turnovers per game. We all know week in and week out the same thing, our team is young and inexperienced that makes poor passing choices on offense along with other things that rack up the turnovers per game. The problem is we do not seem to be getting that much better, I know people will argue that we only had 12 TO’s against KU but who cares about that when you got shut down offensively and beat by 35 points. Against A&M our number was back up to 23 TO’s. I feel that Gillispie is playing with the lineup so much that we can’t get any chemistry on the court, and get comfortable playing with the same guys. It is a big deal to know a teammate good enough to anticipate where he is going to run to open up before the pass leaves your hands, we are not there yet or will be until we play enough with the same guys on the floor.
Fouls | This is another trend that has been run into the ground by me, but I can’t stress enough as being a big deal when it comes down to close games. If you send your opponents to the line and they get free points this will be the difference when the game is within a few points of winning or losing. Tech is #9 in the nation in fouls per game at 22.1 per game. Again, people can point out that we only had 15 personal fouls against KU, but it doesn’t matter when you get beat by 35 points! The A&M game we were right back up there with 25 fouls. It’s the same thing week after week with this trend as well, but I really feel this is just lack of game experience for our young guys and we won’t see a change in these numbers until next season.
Points per Possession | We are #256 in the nation on points made per possession. Our team makes less than 1 point per possession, and this is bad when we don’t get that many possessions a game to do something with the ball when we have it. I am not a fan of our offense right now as I feel we have been figured out by the Big 12 teams. We have no long range shooters that pull the defense out to open up our high-low offensive strategy. Other teams have figured out our best player is Tolbert, so they double him if he touches the pass and try their hardest to deny any post player a pass down low. They can basically clog down low in the posts, and dare our guards to shoot the three. We have no answer and just seem to swing the ball up high, and let the shot clock run down until we have to just jack up a bad shot, or turn the ball over on a bad pass. I really hope we are doing some changes offensively, or all the Big 12 teams will have to do is watch tape of the KU game if they want to beat us.
Bench Points | This is good on our team right now, because we have a new starting lineup every game we do have a lot of guys that have seen the floor and are all improving individually in their own way. Believe it or not in the Kansas game our bench actually outscored theirs, 28 to 26. In the A&M game our bench outscored them 40 to 27. I don’t want people to think this is great, but it is good knowing we have a lot of options on the team that are all getting to showcase their ability and get some much needed game time experience. It will help in the long run, but right now it doesn’t make for a winning formula until we can find that consistent starting lineup that we stick with for every game.
Confidence | This is something I’m afraid of losing, because the season will just get exponentially worse if we don’t have any confidence. We need a big 12 win extremely bad, and if we don’t get one soon it will start to eat away at the teams confidence level. Some of our fans have already started to lose interest with the team, getting people to come to the home games will keep getting harder and harder. At some point people just start talking about the future years and how we will be good, but don’t seem to care about this year. Billy is no longer showing the excitement he displayed at the beginning of the season. We need a win so desperately to revive this team, and our fans that I cannot stand it. So this week against Oklahoma, and Iowa State let’s rally behind the team and hope we can pull off the upset against either one of these 2 pretty good teams we have to play. I don’t want the basketball program to be forgotten about this season, and I want the players to be excited about next season after they get a few big 12 victories behind them.
BIG 12 REPORT
Top Matchups in the Big 12 This Week
#3 Baylor vs. #5 Missouri | Saturday, January 21st. Baylor is coming off their first loss of the season. They are going to be very mad, and take this out on a great Missouri team that only has one loss on the season as well. Since they are playing in Waco, I have a feeling Baylor hands Missouri a big loss even if Missouri is playing some excellent basketball right now.
#7 Kansas vs. Texas| Saturday, January 21st. They are playing in Austin for this one, and Kansas has been whipping opponents and are doing it with ease. Texas is not the dominant team they once were in the past, but I think they need to bring KU down off their high. I could see Kansas winning big in this one, but I’m going to go ahead and call for a UT upset of Kansas in this matchup.
Big 12 Player of the Week
Thomas Robinson | The Kansas junior is the best player right now in the Big 12, last night he and his KU team handed Baylor their first loss of the season. He had 27 points , 14 rebounds , and a block. Against Iowa State he had 11 points, 14 boards, and 3 blocks. And against us he had 19 points and 12 rebounds. Having three games in a week averaging a double-double is pretty good to me.