Lack of experience, depth shows during Kansas State’s road loss against Texas Tech
For a few brief moments, it seemed like the Kansas State men’s basketball team was poised to seriously challenge Texas Tech on Tuesday at United Supermarkets Arena in Lubbock, Texas. But the Wildcats didn’t have enough experience or depth to hang with the Red Raiders for an entire game.
Texas Tech erased an early deficit and won 82-71 thanks to a mixture of strong defense, two-pointers and a whole lot of free throws.
The No. 18 Red Raiders wore down the Wildcats with steady contributions from 10 players, three of which reached double figures. It was difficult for K-State to keep pace with a starting lineup that once again featured three freshmen and limited options off the bench. Foul trouble hurt the Wildcats more than usual with forwards Antonio Gordon, Montavious Murphy and Kaosi Ezeagu all sidelined.
“I thought we made progress on a few things,” K-State coach Bruce Weber said. “Obviously our offense was much better. Our guys did a great job reading their defense, one of the best defenses in the country ... but one-on-one defense and toughness were areas I was worried about. We got beat off the dribble sometimes, well, not sometimes. It was most of the time, especially going into the second half.”
Still, K-State got off to a strong start behind some hot shooting from freshman guard Nijel Pack and led 17-10 in the early going. It also led 29-28 in the final moments of the first half until Texas Tech went on an 8-2 run to take a 36-32 lead into the break.
That swing of momentum was too much for K-State to overcome.
“It’s a long game,” Pack said. “We know they are going to make runs and we are going to make runs. We made improvement. The last couple games we came out kind of sluggish with other teams jumping out on us. It was a good thing for us to be able to jump out on a team today. It shows that we are improving. Now being able to sustain that for 40 minutes is what our goal should be.”
Texas Tech pulled away in the second half and seemed to clinch the game when Terrence Shannon intercepted a pass from Carlton Linguard on the wing and took it the other way for a tomahawk dunk that gave it a 55-41 lead with 13:08 remaining.
To their credit, the Wildcats never gave up and covered the 16-point spread in this game, but they never threatened to win in the second half.
One reason was free-throw shooting. The Red Raiders attacked the basket all night and ended up scoring 30 points from the charity stripe on 36 attempts. Texas Tech forced Davion Bradford and DaJuan Gordon into foul trouble, which made Bruce Weber use some makeshift lineups down the stretch. A pair of technical fouls against Selton Miguel and Seryee Lewis for taunting also hurt.
The Wildcats were less aggressive on offense and only got to the line nine times, but they did make 100% of their foul shots.
Texas Tech also dominated inside. Chris Beard’s team is not usually known for its offense, but it had its way with K-State inside, making 20 of 35 two-pointers.
“It’s all toughness,” K-State senior Mike McGuirl said. “We have got to avoid fouls and guard them one-on-one. They are going to try and pound it in and crash the offensive glass. That is all toughness.”
The Wildcats responded with an encouraging effort on offense that saw Miguel and Pack both score 17 points, while McGuirl and Bradford both scored 10.
Shannon led Texas Tech with 22 points and Mac McClung had 16 points.
Texas Tech (9-3, 2-2 Big 12) evened its conference record with the victory. K-State (5-7, 1-3 Big 12) lost its third straight conference game since opening league play with a win over Iowa State.
The Wildcats will try to bounce back in their next game against Oklahoma State on Saturday at Bramlage Coliseum.
This story was originally published January 5, 2021 at 8:12 PM with the headline "Lack of experience, depth shows during Kansas State’s road loss against Texas Tech."