Texas basketball falls to Purdue thanks to 46 free-throw attempts
In a game where first-year head coach Chris Beard really saw the six-seed Texas basketball leave it all out on the floor, the Longhorn faithful should be proud of this team. Texas took on a tough opponent in the three-seed Purdue Boilermakers, who were the No. 1 ranked team in the AP Poll for much of the regular season.
This was nothing easy for the Longhorns to deal with, but they still fought until the very end.
Texas got big outings from the likes of redshirt senior shooting guard/wing Andrew Jones and senior guard Marcus Carr en route to an unfortunate 81-71 loss to the Boilermakers on this night. Carr was the real star on the night for the Longhorns, though.
Carr had a solid night for the Longhorns where he registered a game-high 23 points on 8-of-18 shooting from the field, 4-of-8 from beyond the arc, and 3-of-5 from the free-throw line. He also gave Texas a game-high seven assists with just two turnovers.
Jones was also an offensive spark plug for the Longhorns in this one as he came up with 17 points on 6-of-13 shooting from the field, 2-of-7 from beyond the arc, and 3-of-4 from the free-throw line. Jones also gave Texas two rebounds, one assist, two steals, and two turnovers.
You have to give a lot of props to the efforts of Jones and Carr, among others, for the Longhorns on this night.
The problem that Texas faced, though, was not being able to get a handle on how to play Purdue’s big men. Thus, Purdue got to the free-throw line at a near record-breaking volume in this game.
Purdue got 46 free-throw attempts to Texas’ 12, which is the biggest discrepancy in the NCAA Tournament in the last decade. Purdue was also just the third team to get to the line at least 46 times in one NCAA Tournament game since 2010.
Texas basketball not able to work past a major free-throw discrepancy in loss to Purdue in the Round of 32
FT Discrepancies in the tourney so far:
— Hook'em Headlines (@HookemHeadlines) March 21, 2022
1 Purdue +34 vs. Texas
2Purdue +21 vs. Yale
3Arkansas +15 vs. NMSU
4Michigan +15 vs. CSU
5Kentucky +14 vs. St. Pete’s
6LSU +13 vs. Iowa State
7Murray State +13 vs. San Francisco
Last thing on this:
— Hook'em Headlines (@HookemHeadlines) March 21, 2022
Purdue’s 46 FTs are third most in a tournament game since 2010. This was also the biggest FT discrepancy of any tournament game in the last decade.
When the Longhorns just aren’t getting this many free ones as their opposition, it’s going to be incredibly difficult to pull out the win. Texas also had some bad offensive droughts that led to them playing catch-up way too often. There was a stretch of this game at one point in the first half where Texas went more than nine minutes without making a single field-goal attempt.
That’s hard to do when trying to upset a team as good as Purdue in March.
Moreover, there are a lot of talking points from this game. It’s just hard to look past the discrepancy in free-throws when they came in this great of a volume for the Boilermakers.
Yet, Beard and the Longhorns have a lot to look forward to with a program that just showed a ton of fight in the NCAA Tournament. This was more fight and competitiveness out of Texas men’s hoops in the postseason than we saw in more than a decade.
This should only continue to provide positive momentum for Beard and the Longhorns building out this program from returning players and by way of the recruiting trail/NCAA Transfer Portal. Texas fans should be optimistic for some better days ahead for this men’s hoops program.
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Following this loss to the Boilermakers in the Round of 32 on March 20, Texas finishes up the 2021-22 season with a record of 22-12 (10-8 Big 12) with their first NCAA Tournament win since 2014. Purdue will now be moving on to face the Cinderella 15-seed St. Peters in the Sweet 16.