The Razorbacks are dangerous enough to beat the Wildcats in Lexington with the Longhorns intent on protecting home court.
The Texas Longhorns are back at the Moody Center on Wednesday hosting the Arkansas Razorbacks in another must-win game for head coach Rodney Terry’s team with the Longhorns boosting their NCAA Tournament odds to 96.6 percent after Saturday’s blowout win over the LSU Tigers in Baton Rouge.
It’s the first home game following a road trip that saw Texas drop a close, hard-fought game to then-No. 23 Ole Miss, have to remain on the road because fog grounded the team’s flight in Oxford, and deal with Terry subsequently spending about 30 hours away from the team while he battled the flu.
Stuck in Mississippi, Terry asked his team to find the “silver lining” in the experience. The result was a 31-point victory over LSU in Baton Rouge as Texas turned in its best shooting performance in conference play at 56 percent from the field while going 10-of-21 shooting from three-point range (48 percent), creating 20 assists, and out-scoring the Tigers 40-26 in the paint.
“I thought our guys really came together over the course of that trip in terms of just being around one another. This team is playing a lot more selfless right now at this point in terms of really trusting their teammates,” Terry said.
It’s hard-fought chemistry for the Longhorns in the current age of heavy roster turnover every year.
“It just takes time, especially in this new era in terms of a one-year roster — in years past, you probably could say if you had retention of guys for two or three years, you probably had a well-oiled machine that knew what you were trying to get done, especially in big moments of games where you’ve got to really execute on offense, you’ve got to really sit down and lock into the details on defense, and know exactly what you’re trying to get done from a scheme standpoint. That’s always a work in progress right now with the team that that comes together in one year,” Terry said.
Some of the necessary growth for the Longhorns has come in the ability to execute in-game adjustments.
“You may go into a game thinking you can do this or do that, and now the in-game adjustments that you have to make, your team has to continue to get better as the season goes along, how to adapt and adjust to the game,” Terry said.
“Maybe it’s how the game’s been officiated. Maybe it’s how we need to change our pick-and-roll coverage. Maybe it’s personnel, how we’re going to guard a guy differently. Maybe it’s how we’re going to attack their personnel, how we’re going to attack their pick-and-roll coverage, but just the nuances of the game and the adjustments within the game, that’s where guys have to get familiar with each other, trust one another, and know that if it’s on the defensive side, guys are gonna have my back if I make a mistake, if it’s on the offensive side, hey, if we run a play, we don’t squander the play, now we’ve got to flow and play out of the play and get a good shot every time down.”
Now up to No. 25 nationally in adjusted offensive efficiency, putting Texas in the 93rd percentile, the Longhorns have had some cold streaks shooting and couldn’t make enough quality looks to upset the Rebels in Oxford, but the offense has improved in some key areas of emphasis for Terry and his staff — sharing the basketball, playing with good ball and player movement, and playing with good pace, areas of execution where SEC defenses make it difficult to run initial actions or even something as simple as dribble handoffs.
An NBA-style way that the Horns have been trying to create early offense is to get into single-drag or double-drag screens on the secondary break if they can’t get easy baskets because those transition screens are so much more difficult to defend than screens on a set defense in half-court play.
Strong team defense by conference opponents also means defenders sitting in gaps after forcing the offense to make plays off the bounce in the half court, a danger of initiating offense late, having dribble handoffs denied, and standing around on offense, all issues at times for Texas in SEC play. So the Longhorns have been emphasizing the need to avoid over dribbling, a predictable and regular outcome stemming from an over reliance on isolation plays.
“You dribble into the gap, there’s someone’s waiting in that gap for you in this league and nine out of 10 times they’re going to probably turn you over, so you’ve got to be to get that ball moving — it’s really hard to play one-on-one basketball in this league because there’s good athletes, good length in this league,” Terry said.
Trying to play inside-out and getting paint touches has been an area of difficulty in SEC games for the Longhorns in part because of senior forward Kadin Shedrick’s low usage rate offensively. During the first six SEC games, the Virginia transfer only took 15 shots in 193 minutes. With Shedrick playing more than 33 minutes a game and not even regularly attempting shots, Texas was getting so little from its frontcourt that it significantly reduced the team’s margin for error by forcing a more mid-range and perimeter-oriented offense with limited paint touches.
Attempting 11 shots in 29 minutes against LSU was a pure usage breakout for Shedrick, who maintained his efficiency in making six shots and scoring a season-high 16 points following three consecutive nine-point outings.
“Kaden Shedrick has given us a post presence. He’s given us a post presence. It changes everything — you want to be able to play inside-out. It’s really hard to go through this conference where you’re coming down, making one pass, and shooting the basketball, the ball doesn’t touch the paint. So we work really hard on trying to get paint touches, just like everybody does, and play inside-out,” Terry said.
Shedrick’s scoring and effective ball movement with three assists weren’t the only areas where he impacted the win over the Tigers — eight of his 10 rebounds came off the defensive glass and his overall activity level defensively created three steals.
Chasing further team defensive improvement, Terry recently challenged star freshman guard Tre Johnson and senior wing Tramon Mark to improve their individual defense in front of their teammates during a film session.
Both responded as Terry pushed Mark to return to the type of defensive effort he played with at Houston before taking on more of a scoring role at Arkansas.
“What he’s done is he’s really got back to getting lost playing really hard on defense — I think that’s the one thing that’s changed his whole game,” Terry said.
Mark tied Johnson with a game-high 18 points against LSU, 16 coming in the decisive second half, spurred by the defensive challenge of locking down the leading scorer for the Tigers, 6’3 transfer guard Cam Carter, who went 2-of-7 shooting for six points and two turnovers in 31 minutes, 11 points below his season average.
“If you’re trying to go out and you’re trying to play really hard on offense, trying to have a great night by shooting your way into a great night, the best guys in the world have a hard time doing that — NBA guys can’t go into a game saying, ‘I’m gonna have a great night by trying to score the basketball,’” Terry said.
“I’ve got to get out there and try to play really hard, get lathered up, play really hard-nosed defense and then when it’s time for me to make a meaningful shot, I’ll make a meaningful shot, when it’s time for me to make a meaningful pass, I’ll make a meaningful pass.”
The most meaningful shot for Mark was the game-winner against Texas A&M. In scoring six points on 2-of-7 shooting in the loss to Ole Miss, Mark wasn’t initially able to build on that momentum-generating basket, but his all-around performance on Saturday was both his best defensive effort of the season and his most points scored.
“I think he’s really bought into, ‘I normally have to guard one of the better offensive players on the other team. I’m going to guard really hard, but I’m also gonna be prepared to score that ball and move the ball whenever I need to or drive it as well.’ So I think that’s really giving him an opportunity to play the way he’s playing right now,” Terry said.
On Wednesday, Mark faces his former Arkansas team. In the past, that would be a big storyline heading into the game, as it was when former Texas guard Tyrese Hunter faced Iowa State, his former team. But the combination of the transfer portal era and the roster turnover in Fayetteville after a coaching change means that there’s only one returning Razorbacks player from last year’s team.
The deeper ties are between Terry and new Arkansas head coach John Calipari — more than part of the larger “coaching brotherhood,” as Terry described it, the two met more than 20 years ago when Terry as an assistant at UNC-Wilmington under his mentor Jerry Wainwright and Calipari was spending time around his alma mater.
“The one thing I’ll say about Coach Cal is Coach Cal has always been great to me. Even when I was working with Coach [Rick] Barnes as an assistant, he was always great to me,” Terry said.
But this isn’t Calipari at any of his apogees as a college coach, from UMass to Memphis to Kentucky. This is Calipari in the twilight of his career following the necessary breakup with the Wildcats amidst a 2-6 start in the conference schedule.
Arkansas is dangerous enough to upset Kentucky at Rupp Arena, 89-79, in an act of vengeance for their head coach’s departure, led by former Wildcats forward Aduo Thiero, who scored 21 points to continue a breakout season with the Razorbacks.
It was only the second road win for a team that has already lost four home games in the league schedule and has some serious offensive deficiencies.
Even if this Arkansas team doesn’t represent Calipari at his prime, it does still reflect hallmarks of his programs — the Hogs are talented and athletic, they play at a fast pace, they attack the paint and the offensive glass, and they’re a typical SEC team in that they disrupt initial actions defensively by applying copious ball pressure.
So although the Longhorns have a 79-percent win probability in another must-win game, the Razorbacks will still present a challenge in a rivalry game that reprises the matchups between Nolan Ricardson’s team and the rebuilding Texas program under Tom Penders in an all-time series the Hogs lead 87-68.
Tip is at 8 p.m. Central on SEC Network.
