Men’s basketball falters late, falls at home to TCU, 64-61

By Steve Habel, Senior Editor

AUSTIN, Texas — Losing close games can infect a team and create doubt in the end game, a time when every shot, every rebound, every pass and every decision is exponentially more important.

It’s a malady that has hampered the Texas men’s basketball team plenty this season, the latest exhibit being a 64-61 loss Wednesday to surging TCU before an announced crowd of 9,661 at the Frank Erwin Center.

It was the fourth time in UT’s past five defeats that the margin between winning and losing was five points or less.

Vladmir Brodziansky scored 19 points including [s2If current_user_can(access_s2member_level2)]the winning basket in the final minute as TCU came from behind to beat Texas for the first time in Austin in 30 years and after 14 straight losses to the Longhorns at the Erwin Center.

The Frogs led, 58-57, with 2:02 to play before a pair of free throws by the Longhorns’ Andrew Jones pushed Texas to the front. A bucket by TCU’s Kenrich Williams was matched on the ensuing trip down the floor by Texas’ Kerwin Roach II before Brodziansky hit a layup with 50.8 seconds to play to put TCU back in front at 62-61.

Roach got all the way to the basket on the Longhorns’ next possession but missed a contested shot and Jaylen Fisher hit two free throws to push the Horned Frogs’ advantage to 64-61. Texas got a final chance to tie when TCU’s Alex Robinson missed two free throws with five seconds to play, but couldn’t get a shot up before the clock ran out.

“We were just trying to get the rebound and get the shot off without a time out, but TCU got its hands on the ball some, and I didn’t get it until about a second was left,” Roach said. “The game should never have got to that point. Losing these close games is very frustrating because we have practiced so hard and put much into the game. We have to stay together and not let games like this separate us.”

Fisher added 16 points for the Horned Frogs (13-2, 2-2 in Big 12 play) while Williams took 13 rebounds.

The Longhorns (7-9, 1-3 Big 12) were led by freshman center Jarrett Allen’s 18 points, while sophomore swingman Tevin Mack added nine points and Jones and center Shaquille Cleare hit for eight each.

“To me, if you’re one of these guys you realize these are games we could have won if we had done something a little bit better,” Texas coach Shaka Smart said. “When we watch the tape we will see that we had a lot of very good shots in the last five minutes and if we can put some of those in then it would have been a different story. If we do certain other things better the game wouldn’t have come down to those final shots.”

Texas forged a 10-4 run, keyed by three-pointers by Mack and Andrew Jones, to cut an early eight-point TCU lead to 18-16 at the 11:37 mark of the opening half.

The Longhorns roared to the front with an 8-0 run over a 1:38 scan of the first half as Roach had a three-point play, Jones hit another three-pointer and Allen scored on a layup to boost Texas to a 32-26 lead. But the Horned Frogs answered with a Robinson three-pointer at the end of the shot clock and a dunk by Brodziansky that cut the advantage to 34-31 with 4:29 to play in the half.

TCU finished the half with a 7-2 run of its own, scoring as another Brodziansky dunk was followed by a Fisher 3-pointer and a Robinson layup with 34 second remaining in the half to grant the Horned Frogs a 38-36 lead at intermission.

TCU outshot Texas 57.1 percent-53.8 percent in the first half and did not go to the free throw line in the first 20 minutes of play.

Fisher led all scorers with 14 points in the half of 5-for-5 shooting (including 4-of-4 from three-point territory) while Brodziansky added 10 for TCU. Texas was paced by eight points each from Allen and Cleare.

The Horned Frogs missed seven of their first eight shots in the second half and Texas took advantage to assume a 44-41 lead with 13:13 remaining. Four points by Allen highlighted the surge, but it was his block of Fisher’s layup attempt on a fast break that helped ignite the Longhorns.

Texas kept up the pace, finding the range via a three-pointer from Eric Davis, Jr. and then a driving layup by Jacob Young to push its advantage to 53-46 with 8:46 to play.

“When you get a team down we have to try to be aggressive,” Smart said. “When you get up six or eight points, the next two or three minutes is crucial. If you can keep the heat on, it demoralizes the opponent.”

Just when it looked like Texas had TCU on the ropes, the Horned Frogs reeled off 10 straight points. Brodziansky’s jumper at the 6:14 mark put TCU back on top and, after an offensive foul on Allen, Desmond Bane’s jumper granted the Horned Frogs a 56-53 lead with 5:23 to play.

TCU led, 56-53, with 3:33 to play before Brodziansky poured in a jumper to push the Horned Frog lead to five points. The Longhorns ended a five-and-a-half-minute scoreless drought on the ensuing possession on a basket by Allen and set the stage for the end game.

“Texas is Texas, and road wins have been few and far between for this program, so this is big,” TCU coach Jamie Dixon said. “This is about the future and about these guys – we need to change things and to change history. It was get-down-to-business time the past three days, but we are still working on taking care of the basketball. We didn’t deliver physicality and toughness in our loss to West Virginia in our last game but we did tonight, especially at the end.”

The Longhorns return to action Saturday when they host No. 10 West Virginia at 3 p.m. Then comes road trips Jan. 17 to currently top-ranked Baylor and Jan. 21 to Kansas.

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