Texas Continues to Be a Second Half Team

Texas does not like to make it easy on itself, even as they improve to 6-2 in the Big 12. In eight conference games the Longhorns have trailed at the half in 5 of them, including all of the past 4. Despite that, they have only lost once in those games. as they pulled out an overtime road win over Iowa State, 71-65.

This time, they had to make a late comeback as the Longhorns were down by 11 with a little more than 10 minutes left and not even 40 points scored at that point. Texas proceeded to outscore Iowa State 25-14, as the Texas defense surged to take away everything inside for the Cyclones.

Jiri Hubalek, who had 22 points in the first 30 minutes for Iowa State, only had 2 for the rest of the game and overtime. Hubalek was completely shut down because the Cyclones could not get him the ball. Hubalek had only one shot attempt in that time.

A.J. Abrams was the big scorer for Texas with 25, via 7-10 on 3s. The rest of the Longhorns were 1-11 outside the perimeter. Texas has to be concerned about the way they play in the first half. They have lacked intensity and focus. Settling for jump shots and only putting defensive effort in spurts.

They may keep winning, but they are forced to play D.J. Augustin and A.J. Abrams huge minutes to do it. Augustin has played 38 minutes or more in all of the conference games and except for one game, the same situation is with Abrams. Both have averaged around 36 minutes for the season. That has to take a toll.