From Texas Sports: The No. 7 Texas Women's Basketball team looks to bounce back from its loss to TCU when it plays host to Kansas on Saturday for Exes Weekend. Tip-off in the Frank Erwin Center is slated for 1 p.m. CT and the game will be televised nationally by Longhorn Network. Texas will welcome back more than 50 former players for its annual Exes Weekend event and those in attendance will be recognized at halftime. Texas is the nation's No. 2 team in rebounding margin with a +14.0 edge on the glass. The Longhorns also rank ninth nationally in rebounds per game with 45.20. Texas has won the battle of the boards in 14 of 15 games this season and, dating back to the start of the 2015-16 campaign, UT has held the edge on the glass in 74 of 85 total games. Offensively, Texas ranks 11th nationally in scoring offense (85.6 ppg) and 11th in scoring margin (+21.6). Junior guard Lashann Higgs, the reigning Big 12 Player of the Week, leads the way for the Longhorns, averaging a squad-best 14.9 points per game and she ranks 17th nationally in field-goal percentage at .593. In conference play alone, Higgs is averaging 21.2 points per game, shooting 65 percent from the field and has a team-high 13 steals. Senior guard Ariel Atkins follows with 14.1 points per game and ranks second in the Big 12 Conference (all games combined) in steals per game (2.7) and fourth in three-point field-goal percentage (.429). Senior guard Brooke McCarty adds 13.9 points per game and a team-high 5.3 assists per game, which ranks fifth in the Big 12. McCarty is second in the league in assist-to-turnover ratio at 2.7. Junior center Jatarie White leads Texas and ranks 16th in the Big 12 in rebounds per game at 6.0, while contributing 10.7 points per game. Texas and Kansas are meeting for the 35th time in the history of the two programs. The Longhorns lead the all-time series 24-10. Texas has won 10 consecutive meetings in the all-time series with Kansas and the Longhorns are 11-4 against the Jayhawks in Austin. The Jayhawks enter Saturday's game with an 11-5 overall record and a 2-3 tally in Big 12 Conference play. Kansas has lost back-to-back games to Baylor and West Virginia. The Jayhawks opened the 2017-18 season with a seven-game winning streak, and they currently rank 16th in the nation in field-goal percentage defense, holding opponents to a shooting percentage of .347 from the field. Junior guard Christalah Lyons leads Kansas, averaging 15.0 points per game and 3.6 assists per game in Big 12 play, which ranks her 15th in scoring and sixth in assists in the conference. She has scored in double figures in 14 of the Jayhawks' 16 games this season.
One thing this KU game is showing me is what I feared in losing to a team like TCU. Great teams have a "fear factor" so to speak. Having a lot of games mentally won before they've even started. We've got to get that edge to where teams like this will know and feel like they have no shot.
Joyner is getting her “sea legs” back so to speak. Getting a lot more in sync with her timing and feel for the game. She’s knocking on double-double’s door today
Thanks for the great preview, WCBBNUT. Great to see Joyner getting more minutes and looking more like herself. Atkins has been fantastic. Higgs and Sutton having very nice games, too. We can only hope Brooke's shooting confidence comes back soon. What is going on between Aston and Rellah? IMO, Rellah deserved to get a least a few minutes. She is as good a rebounder as Mide and offers much more offensively. She has a lot of skills that I hate to see us lose through transfer. I suppose some kind of power struggle. Maybe Aston wants Rellah to leave.
I realize the transitive property of sports doesn't work, but KU doesn't seem very good, and West Virginia and Baylor beat them quite handily.
Overall it was an unsatisfactory win. Texas's depth over-powered Kansas in the second half. But it needs to be like that the entire game. I like what utfannforlife said, opponents need to believe they'll lose to Texas before the game even begins.
Just back from the game: 1) Audrey-Anne pedaling on an exercise bike the ENTIRE game, behind the bench. Man, how many miles did she ride. 2) Rellah in full sweat gear, not even taking shots during warmups 3) Brooke, in a slump, but still has a job to do and does it 4) Really didn't appreciate Audrey-Anne's contribution until she wasn't there, however 5) That allowed a lot more playing time for Joyner, which leads to 6) Growing confidence in Joyner's game. At points, especially in quick offensive rebounds and put-backs it was vintage Joyner. But when she's in the open court, the confidence in the "Now I will drive to the basket" move is not there 7) Everyone had to play today, which is a bad day for Rellah to be missing for mysterious reasons 8) What speech did Karen give to her team at half? Bottle that up and sprinkle it on the team for the start of the UConn game!
I believe someone mentioned that Rellah didn't travel to TCU due to "coach's decision". I assume she did not play today for the same reason. In this instance, I hope my assumption is wrong. I was also hopeful Destiny would be ready to play today. On the positive side, I was happy that Chaz got meaning minutes today.
Destiny also on the sidelines in full sweat gear not taking any shots. Could have detected a slight hitch in her step once, as if some sort of pain. But, it could have been my imagination.
Amazingly quick writeup by the Daily Texan. I quit subscribing to the Statesman years ago and by far this is faster and better than what I could expect from AAS. https://www.dailytexanonline.com/2018/01/13/holmes-and-atkins-power-no-7-texas-past-kansas-79-62 Great insight to what many of us saw today on the floor.
Oh one last thing I didn't add: 9) I was walking the Erwin center during halftime and I saw a very, very talk white girl and thinking, "Man, is she tall I wond-OMG, that's Sedona Prince". She was with two other gals, but I didn't recognize them (probably school teammates). Anyway, the future!
Whether it was the foul trouble or Aston coming to a realization -- whatever the case -- I thought her substitutions, combinations, and leaving the players in long enough to play through some of their mistakes and get comfortable made much more sense against KU. I'm hoping it a realization on her part... even the game announcers made note of it. I thought Joyner and Jatarie did some good things together. Both are big and strong and Joyner gives us the athleticism we've been missing in the paint. I also loved the four guard combination with Jatarie and especially with Joyner. Let those four shoot the ball better (and they will) and that spreads the floor and opens things up. While we looked like CRAP for most of the game, I think I saw us play our way out of that team slump there towards the end of the game... we'll see. Brooke still struggled but she'll come out of that... she's the LEAST of my concerns going forward through the Big 12 and into the post season.
I really liked the high-low game between Joyner and Jatarie and want to see that a lot more often, especially with the 2018 class coming in. Once teams start sagging off a bit to help on the low player, it should open a driving lane or an open midrange shot for the high - Jatarie has shown the ability to hit consistently from the FT line and Joyner is great coming off the bounce.
Agree. All and especially Joyner looked liked they played through whatever it was and found their game again. For what it’s worth, everyone in Austin these past two weeks is either sick, feeling crappy or just feeling a 1/2 step off. I gotta believe the Horns are not immune to whatever was being passed around. Let’s go Horns. Beat the hell out of UConn!
I believe that a lot of teams lately have been playing what Aston refers to as "junk defenses". That means either man-to-man on McCarty and/or McCarty/Atkins. Then play a box if only one in the game(or triangle if both in the game) on the other players. Last year we couldn't score at times when this scheme took McCarty/Atkins out of the offensive flow. This year they still play that.........as Kansas did...........but with Sutton (or others) we are still scoring some. This four guard lineup may be a staple the rest of the year.....especially if Sutton continues her good play. Maybe not Monday.......or perhaps Monday?
I noticed that Kansas absolutely had no idea who to defend when we had both Holmes and White on the floor. Holmes was terrific yesterday. Clearly she is ready to get some serious minutes against UConn. Sutton too. Really wish I knew what was up with Boothe.
I don't expect UConn to play any junk defenses. They usually just play tough man-to-man, I think. I do think other teams will definitely go to junk in Big 12 play. We didn't handle junk defenses well last year at all.
It's called "Cedar Fever". Many great things about Austin, but besides the traffic, allergy season is the worst.
Not at all. Maybe zone if they get into foul trouble but thats about it. 2-2-1 Press and M2M defense.
