#4 Texas Easily Handles Rice, 80-54

by Peter Bean on Dec 8, 2007 8:58 PM CST in Texas Longhorns Basketball

No trouble for Texas tonight as the Longhorns move to 9-0 on the season following an 80-54 win over the Rice Owls in Houston.

No postgame react until tomorrow, as I'm dead tired. I've got several pages of notes, but we'll save it for tomorrow. For now, we congratulate Texas on taking care of this week's business and avoiding a post-UCLA let down.

More tomorrow.

--PB--

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Don't Look Past The Next Two

Oral Roberts and Texas State. After that Michigan State and Wisconsin. Stay healthy and take play our game, our chances look good going into conference.

by littlerearl on Dec 8, 2007 9:18 PM CST reply actions

rice game

I saw the horns live this season the 1st time tonight. the guys who impressed me the most as athletes were James, Wingman, and Mason (who can really jump a lot better than I realized). Atchley is also a better athlete than I realized. The vision and poise and control of Augustin are just amazing. Chapman seemed to be getting tired pretty easily. Pittman just could not jump much. I think it will be another year before we see the real Dexter Pittman. One hilarious play occurred when a rice guy tried to penetrate, looked up and saw Dexter coming over and then immediately turned 180. It was so funny that lots of people where I was sitting started laughing.

The horns fans were overly polite and quiet for the most part.

I saw Kansas today and was very impressed. they are very tall and seem to run a slick offense that gets them a lot of layups. It will be interesting to see how UT does vs. Kansas in conference play.

by Kafka on Dec 8, 2007 10:23 PM CST reply actions

Chances of running the table?

What do you say guys? Could we be the next St. Josephs or Illinois? Just asking.

We still play a number of challenging teams for non-conference (Mich St, Wisconsin, St. Marys, Oral Roberts), and there are some obstacles in the Big XII too (Kansas, @ A&M, @ K-state with Beastley).

If we can win at Michigan State, then I believe there's about a 5% chance it could happen (which is really high by the way). The other non-conf games definitely winnable. I think we can beat KU because of playing at home. The really challenging game is @ A&M. If we can win those, then we're set.

This is a relatively young team though, so there's supposed to be some inconsistency, leading to bad losses. I haven't really seen that though. Talent alone can help us survive some of the trap games.

by goingforthecorner on Dec 9, 2007 12:50 AM CST reply actions

WTF

title=

How big can those shorts get? He looks like he's either wearing 20 pairs of boxers underneath those shorts or he let out a gigantic fart that can't seem to escape!

by goingforthecorner on Dec 9, 2007 1:01 AM CST reply actions

ummm who's Rodney Terry?

From the AP recap:

It was a homecoming for a half dozen Texas players who attended high school in the Houston area. Those players were Connor Atchley, Augustin, Gary Johnson, Dexter Pittman, Harrison Smith and Rodney Terry.

by goingforthecorner on Dec 9, 2007 1:04 AM CST reply actions

Is he akin...

...to Tacopants, the nine foot tall invisible (to everyone but Chad Henne) Michigan receiver that's always open, and always right behind other wide open receivers?

Growing up, I only fed Jared Norton paper. That's why he eats plays.

by Horn Brain on Dec 9, 2007 2:30 AM CST up reply actions

Turns out

that Rodney Terry is UT's assistant coach

They were still wrong though. They said "player".

by goingforthecorner on Dec 9, 2007 2:40 AM CST up reply actions

Harrison Smith

Speaking of Harrison Smith, how did he look? I see in the boxscore that he got four minutes with two rebounds and a steal. I have my eye on this guy to provide some backcourt depth in conference play.

by Caradoc on Dec 9, 2007 10:45 AM CST up reply actions

Lost

He looked lost out there, I'm afraid. He had one nice defensive play (a block), but a terrible turnover and a three pointer that wasn't close.

--PB--

by Peter Bean on Dec 9, 2007 11:17 AM CST up reply actions

Close Your Eyes

I was unable to see much of the Rice game. However, I have not seen Harrison Smith look good in any game in the last two years. He doesn't play within the flow of the offense and constantly looks to get up his shot. He does get a steal or rebound or two but never looks comfortable.

I would be shocked if Harrison plays at all in conference play. And I will be even more shocked if he is even on the Horns next August.

Backcourt rotation in '08: Mason, Balbay, Abrams, and J'Covan Brown (maybe Tyreke Evans too). Smith isn't better than any of those players and will not be gaining any minutes next year either.

I'm sure he is a nice kid but hasn't developed quickly enough and probably needs to transfer if he wants to see more action.

--AW--

by awiggo on Dec 9, 2007 11:36 AM CST up reply actions