Texas Longhorns Roundball Roundup: Fun with Small Sample Sizes

Burnt Orange Nation's Jeff Haley put up a nice post highlighting some "inside the numbers" factoids about this year's team. I'm here to take that a step further and look at some interesting numbers for each individual player. Caveat: small sample size applies.

Cameron Ridley (13.4%): That's Ridley's block percentage, an estimate of 2-point field goals blocked while Ridley is on the floor. That currently ranks him 19th in the nation (amongst players with minimum minutes played). By comparison, Kansas' Jeff Withey ended last year at 13.67%.

Prince Ibeh (84.4%): According to hoop-math.com, that's the number of attempts taken by Ibeh at the rim (i.e., layups, dunks, and tip-ins). Ibeh ended last year at 83.3%, while Ridley has attempted 63% of his shots this year at the rim. One of these guys has some semblance of post skills; the other does not. I'll let you guess who's who.

Jonathan Holmes (11-23): Holmes has attempted 23 3's on the year, and hit on 11. That's good for 47.8%. In his first two years combined, Holmes hoisted 85 shots from long distance, hitting just 27%. Massive improvement from the big fella.

Connor Lammert (1): Jeff touched on this in his post, but Lammert has just 1 turnover all year long, which gives a major boost to his astronomical 155.5 O-Rtg (an advanced metric estimating points produced; the higher the better). As I mentioned in an earlier roundup, Lammert is a high-IQ, low-touch player that serves as an asset on the offensive end.

Kendal Yancy (8-20): After following a 1-6 showing against Texas-Arlington with a 2-6 performance versus Vanderbilt, Yancy's free throw percentage sits at a dismal 40% on the year. Even Tristan Thompson shot 48.7% at Texas! Put some gym time in, Kendal.

Demarcus Holland (82.5%): Holland leads the team in minutes played, logging 82.5% of available minutes. Clearly, Rick Barnes has a lot of faith in the defensive stopper. If he can keep up his offensive efficiency as outlined in Jeff's post, we may be seeing an all-conference player by the time Holland's career is over.

Damarcus Croaker (65.8%): Of Croaker's field goal attempts, over 65% of them have come from beyond the arc. Further, he's been assisted on 87.5% of his made 3's, meaning Croaker is functioning almost purely as a catch-and-shoot option on offense. For a guy billed as explosive and athletic coming into college, he needs to do more in the flow of the offense.

Martez Walker (11): Walker has logged 11 minutes in the last four games combined. He's not a rotational guy at this time.

Javan Felix (23.0%): Despite starting the season as the primary 2-guard, Felix's assist percentage is a slight uptick higher than Taylor's. Felix has logged 26 assists on the year, compared to 28. Though Barnes clearly wants to cast Felix as a scorer, he has done a nice job facilitating the offense and serving as a nice complement to Taylor as the backup lead guard.

Isaiah Taylor (8): Taylor has started every one of Texas' 8 games at point guard. And done a capable job. As a true freshman. Ranked as around the 300th best high school senior in the nation. That's simply incredible.

All Things Burnt Orange:

Texas 72, UT-Arlington 69 (Fri) | Texas 70, Vanderbilt 64 (Tues) | Weekly Record 2-0 | Overall Record 7-1

The Longhorns narrowly avoided a letdown loss to the UT from the north, but followed that up with a solid win in the first Big 12-SEC Challenge game at home against Vandy. Texas now sits at a peachy 7-1. Three of its next four games are against Temple, North Carolina, and Michigan St. Those three teams rank 93rd, 19th, and 4th, respectively, in Ken Pomeroy's rankings. If the Longhorns can come out of non-conference play at 10-3 (or better), they're in good shape.

Big 12 Power Rankings:

No time for snarky comments this week.

1. Iowa St. Cyclones (6-0)

The last undefeated team in the Big 12 gets the pole position this week.

2. Kansas Jayhawks (7-1)

Kansas' win over Duke trumps Oklahoma St.'s best win against Michigan. Losing to Villanova on a neutral court isn't a resume-killer, but slogging through a win against UTEP had better just be a hangover.

3. Oklahoma St. Cowboys (7-1)

After trouncing Memphis, the Tigers got their revenge after a rematch in the Old Spice Classic.

4. Baylor Bears (7-1)

The Bears made it to the championship game in Maui, falling to Syracuse. A tough test in Jerryworld against Kentucky looms.

5. Oklahoma Sooners (6-1)

Beat Mercer more soundly than Texas did. So there's that.

6. Texas Longhorns (7-1)

Still rolling.

7. West Virginia Mountaineers (6-2)

Surprisingly not terrible this year. KenPom has them ranked 15 spots higher than the Horns.

8. Texas Tech Red Raiders (6-3)

Beat Houston. Rick Barnes is envious.

9. Kansas St. Wildcats (4-3)

Running out of things to say.

10. TCU Horned Frogs (4-3)

Lost to Harvard.