TEXAS TECH (7-14, 0-9)
VS. TEXAS (13-9, 3-6) Game Essentials
Date | February 4, 2012Time | 6:00 pm Location | Austin, TX TV | Longhorn Network Radio | Affiliates Texas Tech Starting 5
Kevin Wagner (5-8/145) | 2.6 PPG | 1.5 APGJavarez Willis (5-11/171) | 8.0 PPG | 1.9 APG Terran Petteway (6-6/182) | 4.4 PPG | 2.1 RPG Jordan Tolbert (6-7/210) | 11.9 PPG | 6.0 RPG Robert Lewandowski (6-10/256) | 7.2 PPG | 3.7 RPG Texas Starting 5
Myck Kabongo (6-1/169) | 9.9 PPG | 5.3 APGJ'Covan Brown (6-1/197) | 19.7 PPG | 3.9 APG Julien Lewis (6-3/190) | 8.2 PPG | 3.8 RPG Alexis Wangmene (6-7/241) | 4.5 PPG | 4.5 RPG Clint Chapman (6-10/245) | 6.9 PPG | 5.6 RPG |
WHAT TO EXPECT
CHANGES ON THE WAY | The Texas Tech season has been mired by playing teams tough for the first part of the game, and then woefully falling behind in the second half. It's about depth and it's about talent. I can't remember where I heard this, maybe on something with Tech Talk, but one of the assistant coaches was asked if there would be changes to the roster other than the two open roster spots and the reply, was without hesitation, yes. And perhaps my optimism a few weeks ago that these guys would not be cut, but I think that's the case and right now, the four players that are signed, there could be more signees on the way. I've got a feeling that head coach Billy Gillispie is just going to roll through players until he finds the right combination. Do not get married to any player on this team, they all have a chance to be cut, maybe other than Crockett, Tolbert and Gotcher, and maybe Petteway, but that's about it.
NOT WHAT WAS EXPECTED | I don't know if it's just me, but I wasn't expecting Texas to be 3-6 in the Big 12. Granted, I also didn't think that Texas Tech would be staring at 0-10 in the conference either, but Texas has seemingly reloaded each year that they had early entrants into the NBA, but this year is different. UT lost a ton of freshmen last year to the NBA and that has seemingly caused some issues for the Longhorns. Brown is by far the best player, but their other two leading scorers are both freshman, Kabongo and Sheldon McClellan. And there's just not a lot of depth for UT in the frontcourt and conference play is usually when that sort of thing shows up, much like for Texas Tech.
KEY MATCHUPS
BROWN VS. WILLIS | I think this is one of those situations where Brown is assuredly going to get his points. He's not shot the ball particularly well, but he's a volume shooter and you know that he's going to take a lot of shots. Willis will need to try to force some bad shots for Brown, but Willis also cannot be a liability on offense, which has been the case more times than not for Texas Tech.
MCCLELLAN VS. CROCKETT | One of the few bright spots for Texas Tech has been the recent play of Crockett, who has been awfully efficient of late, although I don't think he's getting enough shots. Either way, he is contributing and he's one of the few players for the team that can create his own shot as well. McClellan isn't the biggest player, but UT seemingly has a smaller lineup, so maybe this would be a situation where Texas plays McClellan and due to matchups, Crockett can post-up a smaller player (McClellan is only 6-4/188) or make things difficult for Texas at the high post. The problem for Texas Tech has always been that they can essentially just concentrate on a couple of players on the floor as it seems that TTU usually only has maybe two offensive threats on the floor at any given time. That's been a big part of the problem for this team is that there's few players that can other teams to adjust, even though Tolbert has been better.
*As you will note, the game is on the Longhorn Network, so most likely, you will not get to see this game. Keep in mind that due to the situation regarding teams and the Big 12 Network being able to pick up games, Texas Tech did not have the ability to not permit this game to be on the LHN, which is different than in football, where the conference partner must agree to be on the LHN. Or at least, this is how I understand it.