The ball rolled around the rim like it had been thrown onto a roulette table. For a brief second, the fans were given relief to their eardrums, but through the silence in the Bon Secours Wellness Arena, all that could be heard were gasps.
The gap was cut to just four after Texas led earlier in the game by 15, but how?
Ole Miss head coach Yolett McPhee-McCuin put it rather simply in the post-game press conference: “They threw a punch. We threw a punch back.”
Basketball and boxing are not as different as one might think. Both rely on quick footwork, reliable hand-eye coordination and the ability to react to an opponent’s movements. And at the core, both sides will do anything to win.
“We’re gonna get down and we’re gonna roll our sleeves up,” McPhee-McCuin said.
In the 40-minute fight, 53 total fouls landed. With 27 on the Rebels and 26 on the Longhorns, nine players between both squads reached at least four fouls.
“Your toughness and competitive spirit will be challenged,” Texas head coach Vic Schaefer said later on.
The Longhorns controlled the ring during the third quarter, reaching a 13-point lead by the bell. The Rebels, unable to find their rhythm, did not score a field goal for the last eight minutes of the period, but they kept their hands and heads up.
“I said ‘10 minutes to go’ in the huddle,” Ole Miss graduate guard KK Deans said. “We went in with the attitude: You lose, you go home. So we, of course, we’re gonna fight.”
A quick 7-0 run led by an and-one layup by Deans brought the Longhorns’ lead down to just eight. Even as junior center Kyla Oldacre ended the Texas drought with a layup to bring the lead back up to 10, Deans wasn’t going to back down without a fight.
In the span of a minute and a half, Deans landed three triples to cut the lead down to two, now down 58-60.
But No. 1 Texas pulled through. Even with sophomore forward Madison Booker reaching her fifth foul in the last minute, the Longhorns escaped, not allowing a field goal in the last 2:26 of the game. Texas would go on a 10-5 run to win 70-63 and escape with its 30th win of the year, now set to take on No. 9 LSU in the semi-final on Saturday.
Schaefer, in his 40th year of coaching, is ready for the quick turnaround.
“I’m a creature of habit,” Schaefer said. “I follow the same practice plans. Practice number 90 this year was the same as last year for the most part. I always feel good about my teams and their conditioning, and again, they’re competitors.”
A typical Texas practice requires endurance. Schaefer expects his team to pick up a full-court press for 40 minutes, and practices to be ready for that. For example, the “Longhorn” is one drill Schaefer has in his back pocket. It’s four minutes of nonstop fast-break basketball. It’s grueling, but it teaches his team to keep pushing.
“I think there’s a method to our madness,” Schaefer said.
It’s why Texas women’s basketball is 30-2, No. 1 in the country and set to earn their second straight No. 1 seed in the NCAA tournament. It’s why Schaefer has reached three Elite Eights in four seasons on the Forty Acres. This team does play chaotic, but more in the sense of a well-choreographed dance.
And on the horizon of madness, chaos usually tends to punch through.
