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Game Recap
Tortilla Tossin’ Player of the Game: I guess I’ll go with Jarrett Culver here, but could easily go with Tariq Owens. Culver did score 17, but it took 16 shots to get there (that’s not efficient), had 7 rebounds, 3 assists, 5 steals, and 3 turnovers. Considering the 37 minutes, the 3 turnovers is better, but you’d still like to have more assists than turnovers.
Defender of the Game: Tariq Owens. Still affecting the game in ways no one else can.
Multi-Purpose Player of the Game: Owens gets both defender and multi-purpose awards. He still the best player on the team at affecting shots. Owens finished with 12 points on 5 of 8 from the floor, the only other player in double-figures, 6 rebounds, 1 block, a steal, and 1 turnover.
Game Notes:
- 45 points. Well, that’s not ideal Bob. Texas Tech shot 33% from the floor, 22% from the three-point line and only went to the free throw line 11 times. This team is in a real funk offensively, so much so that Chris Beard started Brandone Francis over Tariq Owens. Both received starter minutes, Francis played 27 and Owens played 33, so this wasn’t a demotion, but trying to do something to get the team on track offensively. Francis is arguably a good offensive player and had a good outing the last time out, but Francis struggled last night, as did everyone else except for Owens. Seriously, take away Owens’ 5-8 from the field and the rest of the team shot 26.8% from the floor.
- There are certain things that a team can do to try to get some easy buckets and right now, Texas Tech isn’t doing any of them. You can try to run a bit and create easy opportunities that way, but Texas Tech only had 2 fast break points. You can try to crash the boards, but Texas Tech only had 6 second-chance points. You can have some real movement in the offense to create opportunities, but Texas Tech only had 7 assists. All of the things that you need to do, Texas Tech just isn’t doing right now. Some of these things affect your ability to play defense, like crashing the boards, so I think that this is one of those things where we see what Beard values, which is defense over offense.
- Last night wasn’t on Culver. He didn’t shoot well, but he didn’t play terribly. I think the main problem here is that there are not enough guys on this team that can create their own shots.
- I’m not smart enough to know how to fix the offense and I don’t know that it can be fixed, but K-State is a terrific defensive team and they are even better when they have a healthy Wade. They’re also a team that’s been together for a long time, similar to Texas Tech’s team last year. K-State should be good and they are.
- I think things will get a bit easier with Arkansas up next. A break from conference play should be beneficial and I think that Texas Tech should get back into the winning column on Saturday.
- Head coach Chris Beard on the struggling offense:
“First of all it is about K-State’s defense,” Texas Tech coach Chris Beard said. “One team this year has broken 70 on them. We knew it was going to be a difficult game to score so we set up a game plan. We have to score on different levels to play against teams like this. You have to get some points off your fast break and we had very few. We had to get points off our secondary break. We had very few. You have to score points off your defense and we had a few in the first half. I thought our guys were dialed in and played really hard in the first half. We just did not make enough shots.”
Highlights
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