Texas Basketball: How good defense isn’t translating to Longhorn wins

Good defense can always mean good things for the Texas basketball program, but efficient offense presents a much stronger correlation to winning games.

A good start to the 2019-20 regular season for the Texas basketball program did anything to pay dividends come the start of Big 12 play. Head coach Shaka Smart saw his Texas team start out slow in the Big 12 slate. They opened up Big 12 play with a 59-44 loss at the hands of the now No. 1 ranked Baylor Bears. Since then, they’ve gone 4-7 in Big 12 play and already reached a double-digit number of losses on the season.

Overall on the season so far, Texas carries a record of 14-10 (4-7 Big 12). They racked up their seventh loss in Big 12 play and 10th loss on the season overall after a Feb. 10 loss at home to No. 1 Baylor by the final score of 52-45. Texas has now stretched their losing streak to three games and holds a record of 9-5 at home at the Frank Erwin Center.

The loss to Baylor in front of a nationally televised audience on ESPN on Monday night brought up a bigger theme on the season that is how good defense is not getting Texas where it needs to be in the win column. This season isn’t the first time that Smart’s team continued to play suffocating defense against good opposition but didn’t translate to more success where it counts.

Here’s a look into how the solid defense that the Texas Longhorns basketball program played so far this season hasn’t translated into wins and is putting a lot of pressure on the shoulders of fifth-year head coach Shaka Smart.