Texas Basketball: 3 overreactions after the last-second win over OU

Marcus Carr is the most valuable player in the Big 12 so far this season

It’s hard to believe that I’m saying that senior guard Marcus Carr should be getting legitimate consideration for the Big 12 Player of the Year honors if the season were to end today. At the outset of the regular season, it seemed like Hunter was going to be the face of this guard rotation.

That perception of Hunter taking the lead as the face of this guard rotation, and possibly the program as a whole, has shifted greatly in the last few weeks given how well Carr has played of late.

Carr is putting up some insane numbers on both ends of the floor in the last few weeks. In the last five games, Carr is averaging a solid 23.2 points per game, 1.8 rebounds, 3.6 assists, 1.8 steals, and just 1.6 turnovers while shooting 53.6 percent from the field and an insane 61.8 percent from beyond the arc.

The five-game winning streak that the Longhorns are currently sitting on would not be possible without Carr. He willed the Longhorns to an overtime win a few weeks ago, in Terry’s first game as the acting head coach, over the Rice Owls at home at the Moody Center.

Carr also had a career night with a whopping 41 points in the 97-72 win over the Texas A&M-Commerce Lions on Dec. 27.

And while the scoring wasn’t at the same level as it was in the four games prior for Carr against the Sooners this weekend, he was still tremendous in many phases of the contest. His 13 points tied for a team-high. Carr was also arguably the best defender for Texas in the win over Oklahoma. He put up a game-high four steals as senior guard Grant Sherfield had a tough time finding his shot from deep.

All in all, I would definitely say that Carr is playing some of the best basketball of his collegiate career in the last month or so. He’s also the clear-cut team MVP at this point of the season.

There is also a good case to be made that Carr is the Big 12’s MVP so far this season. All that really needs to be said to make an argument for Carr as the Big 12 MVP so far is the fact that he leads the conference in four of the most notable advanced metrics.

Carr is at the top of the Big 12 this season in win shares (2.8), win shares per 40 minutes (.285), box plus/minus (11.6), and player efficiency rating (25.8).