Shooting From the Corner: TCU Horned Frogs at Texas Longhorns

With 10:43 left in the first half, the Texas Longhorns led the TCU Horned Frogs 12-10. From that point, Texas went on a 19-6 run to close out the half as they beat TCU 66-43. TCU chipped away at the lead in the 2nd half, closing to within 7 with 9 minutes left, but Texas turned on the jets and never looked back. Rick Barnes notched his 600th career victory; out of several thousand coaches in the history of the game, less than 90 have done what Rick Barnes has done.

Positives

• Cameron Ridley is about back to his sophomore season form, and we need to recognize his quietly effective production in a lineup full of trees. There was nothing quiet about his game tonight though, notching 15 points and 12 rebounds and getting the cell number of Trent Johnson's wife. Oh, and he nearly killed a backboard with a trident.

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• Javan Felix was available "if necessary". 6 minutes into the game, Barnes felt he was necessary, and Javan responded with a shot that was off the front of the rim and a couple of slow defensive rotations. If I were Barnes, I would've pulled him and let him rest some more. This is why I'm not a coach. Javan had a great night, scoring 16 points on 5/8 shooting, plus 4 assists and 0 turnovers. He also spelled Isaiah Taylor at the point effectively. Great night for Javan, he looks 100%.
• Kendal Yancy hit his first two 3s, nearly hit the 3rd, and nailed all 4 free throws. 0 assists and 2 turnovers aren't great(not to mention 4 fouls in 22 minutes), but he forced the TCU zone to step out a little further so mission accomplished. Texas needs more of that from him.
• Rick Barnes is shortening his rotation and going with a 3-guard lineup more often. The litmus test for how committed he is to this setup will be when Jonathan Holmes is cleared to play, but the move to 3 guards and the 'Blocker Mover' scheme seems to be helping the offensive flow so far.

The 2014-2015 Texas Longhorns Memorial(™) Mixed Bag Category

• This might be nitpicky(you kinda have to be to complain in a 23-point win), but it would have been nice to see the team come out in the 2nd half and put their foot on TCU's throat. Instead, they played like they expected TCU to fold and coasted for awhile. They woke up after a timeout where Rob Lanier yelled at them a little bit and proceeded to take the game over, but still...not ideal.
  

Negatives

• Myles Turner was really quiet tonight; while I didn't see anything terrible from his game(he made himself available at the top of the key against the zone with regularity) and his minutes suffered a bit because of Cam's night, this is the kind of team Myles should dominate and he didn't.

Texas sits at 5-6 in conference play with a chance to get back to .500 against Texas Tech at home on Saturday. Tip is at 7pm Central on Longhorn Network.