Game Links:
Tortilla Tossin’ Player of the Game: Let’s go with Kyler Edwards? Maybe the 6th man role for him will work. Edwards made 2 of 6, including 2 of 4 from the three-point line, had 8 boards, 2 assists, 2 blocks, and no turnovers in about 20 minutes of time. The 8 rebounds led the team.
The Motion:
- Return of the McCullar. Let that song go through your head for a while . . . “you lied to me”. Anyway, really great to see Kevin McCullar return. He was absolutely the player I remembered, created offense for himself by being active and opportunistic around the basket as well as a really nice jumper, which is terrific. In just 12 minutes, he scored 11 points, grabbed 3 boards, had 2 assists and was all over the place.
- A quiet night from Mac McClung, but he’s really impressing me with his passes and ability to find the open man. If he can work on the turnovers, he’s going to be really tough to stop. Quiet is 8 points, 7 boards, 3 assists, 3 turnovers, and 2 steals.
- Marcus Santos-Silva, Edwards, and McCullar all scored in double-figures and this game felt out of reach for Incarnate Word n the first half, which is absolutely not fair, but it was really a cumulative effort.
- Texas Tech had 7 turnovers and 17 assists. Pretty good rate. Texas Tech scored 1.234 points per possession, which lines up just perfectly is you like order. Incarnate word was .785. Texas Tech forced 20 turnovers and scored 26 points off of those turnovers. Texas Tech had 17 offensive boards, which helped with a 20-3 advantage in 2nd chance points. Texas Tech dominated the paint, 42-16. Another good stat, in the second half, the team only had 2 turnovers, which is when the non-starter types were mostly in the game.
- Two worrisome stats were the free throws, only 65% made for Texas Tech, 15 of 23. And not a great night shooting in the second half. First half, the team made 46% of their shots and only 41% in the second. Also a bit worrisome is the three-point shooting, only 2 of 9.
- Generally speaking, I thought the ball movement on offense was nice. Maybe tried a bit too hard to share, but that’s being picky. The defense was really terrific for the most part. Incarnate Word shot 24% in the first half and 48% in the second, but 36% for the game. That’s sort of basketball and the Cardinals sort of went on a run late that really didn’t matter (except for those of you who bet on the game). This was probably a pretty good game for a tune-up before Oklahoma State on Saturday. Texas Tech looked a bit tentative to start the game, but after the first 3 or so minutes, I thought that they played as well as they could.
- Funny personal moment while watching the game, Youssouf asked about the “narrators” and if they knew the player names. Never thought about announcers as narrators, but that’s pretty accurate.
- At the end of the game, Mark Adams boxed a guy in a bear suit. I mentioned on Twitter after the game, that Mark Adams knocking out a guy in a bear suit was the second best thing that happened last night, the first being the return of Kevin McCullar. In the press conferenced, Beard sort of begged for a question about the bear, asking if any of the reporters had a question, which Carlos Silva stepped up to ask that question. Beard said that he thought Adams handled himself well and that he didn’t know too many West Texas grandpas that could handle a bear like he did.
- Head coach Chris Beard:
“The way we approached the game tonight was that it was the most important game we’ve ever played or coach,” Beard said. “This was the next game on the schedule. If you feel any different, you don’t know how to compete. We had one focus the last couple of days and that was to beat Incarnate Word. We weren’t thinking of what’s next.”
- Up next? Oklahoma State on Saturday, January 2nd (the first game in 2021) at 3:00 p.m. with the game set to be broadcast on ESPN+.
Highlights
Postgame, assistant coach Mark Adams fought and KO’d a bear, because obviously. pic.twitter.com/ZMoi2JGrhp
— Eric Kelly (@EricKellyTV) December 30, 2020