Texas Basketball: Late rally to beat Kansas can turn the tide this season

For most of the game for No. 14 ranked Texas basketball against the rolling and No. 17 ranked Kansas Jayhawks on the night of Feb. 23, it looked like they wouldn’t be able to pull off the comeback. Head coach Bill Self and his Jayhawks team controlled the game most of the way. But it was head coach Shaka Smart and his squad that took control of the game when it mattered most.

This game largely felt like the opposite team than were accustomed to out of the Longhorns on the hardwood during Smart’s tenure as head coach. The accomplished season continued to get better for the Longhorns in this win over the Jayhawks at home at the Frank Erwin Center on Feb. 23, by the final score of 75-72.

Smart’s Longhorns really showed up on the defensive end of the floor once again to get this win over the Jayhawks by the narrow three-point margin. Between 20 minutes in the second half and five minutes of overtime, the Longhorns allowed just 29 points. It was mainly that bad first half for Texas on the defensive end of the floor that contributed to the Jayhawks 72 total points in the game.

Kansas scored 43 of their 72 points in the first half, and took an 11 point lead into the locker room at halftime.

How Texas basketball got the win over KU

Texas got this win over Kansas with a well-rounded effort from their starting five on both ends of the floor. Breakthrough sophomore power forward Kai Jones was also solid for the Longhorns once again coming off the bench.

Jones provided the Longhorns with an efficient 10 points off the bench, to go along with eight rebounds, one assist, and one steal. He shot 4-of-5 from the field, 0-of-1 from beyond the arc, and 2-of-4 from the charity stripe.

Redshirt junior shooting guard/wing Andrew Jones was a good example of the grittiness that Texas needed to win this game, despite bad shooting on the offensive end. Jones gave the Longhorns a double-double in this win over the Jayhawks, despite shooting just 3-of-14 from the field.

Jones also gave the Longhorns 10 rebounds, one assist, and two steals. A double-digit rebounding effort on the defensive end, along with two steals, isn’t what you usually get on that end of the floor out of Jones. But it was a nice thing to witness against a hot Jayhawks team.

The backcourt/wing rotation as a whole didn’t fair too well shooting in this game. Senior guard Matt Coleman, junior guard Courtney Ramey, and Jones, shot a combined 9-of-36 from the field and 2-of-17 from beyond the arc in this game. But that trio also combined to shoot 19-of-22 from the free-throw line, which made up for their poor shooting from the field a tad.

All in all, this was a very gritty win for the Longhorns that was well deserved in overtime. Texas got it done when they needed to down the stretch, and outrebounding the Jayhawks by a margin of a dozen was the key factor for them.

Coming off a tough loss to the West Virginia Mountaineers last weekend, Texas really needed this win over Kansas. Next up for Smart and the 14-6 (8-5 Big 12) Longhorns is a meeting on the road with head coach Chris Beard and the Texas Tech Red Raiders on the morning of Feb. 27.