Survive and advance: Texas onto the Round of 32

Survive and advance: Texas onto the Round of 32

The Texas Longhorns beat the Colorado State Rams 56-44 Thursday night to advance to the Round of 32. 

Before getting to the good and bad of tonight's game, this win has real meaning for the Texas program.

With the win tonight, Texas has won a Round of 64 NCAA Tournament game for the third straight season. The last time that happened was the a stretch from the 2006-07 season to the 2008-09 season under Rick Barnes. Texas won a first round game four straight years from 2005-06 through the 2008-09 season, including a pair of Elite Eight appearances. 

That alone makes the win tonight a big one for the Texas program. 

The good

Texas team defensive effort. The athleticism of Tyrese Hunter and Chendall Weaver overwhelmed Colorado State. And the Texas forwards did a very good job of speeding up the Colorado State bigs the entire night. Texas guarded the ball, defended in ball screen action, defended physically off the ball in offensive action played physical and defended the rim well considering Dylan Disu was in foul trouble the majority of the night. 

Brock Cunningham made two hustle plays in the first half to gain an extra possession that were key in continuing the Texas run. Chendall Weaver brough great energy off the bench. 

Ithiel Horton grabbed seven big rebounds from the off guard position. 

Tyrese Hunter gave tremendous on ball defensive effort with active hands in the passing lanes. 

Texas played both an athletic and smart defensive team against an opponent they could overwhelm with quickness and speed. The 44 points scored were the least for Colorado State in three seasons. 

More on the good of Chendall Weaver at the end. 

The bad

Texas got some very good and clean looks in the first ten minutes of the game. They just flat out missed a lot of clean looks, and looks that Dylan Disu and Max Abmas have knocked down for the majority of the season. Texas two man game with Abmas and Disu created the looks Texas desired, and allowed others to play off of that in favorable situations.

This was a game in which one play kind of told the story offensively for Texas. Texas ran Abmas on a curl action off the ball, and Abmas made the correct play getting one foot in the paint off the dribble to draw defensive help/rotation and kicked to Ithiel Horton - who correctly took three or four steps to the corner to create optimal space. Horton hit the corner three, but stepped on the sideline on the catch. That pretty much summed up Texas offensively Thursday night. 

Dylan Disu forced some shots after getting off to a rough start. Was too much of a ball stopper on 2-3 possessions (he did make a mid-range on one of them). The early good look misses couple with foul trouble sped him up on offense. 

When Disu is in foul trouble, Texas ball screen/two man game takes a major step back. Any possession with Dillon Mitchell as the main screener is not a good offensive possession unless the opponent plays the possession poorly. Texas is very easy to defend when Dillon Mitchell is the main ball screener. When Mitchell and Tyrese Hunter are the two man ball screen action - that's not a high percentage winning possession. 

Max Abmas, a career 88.7% free throw shooter, with a pair of not normal misses in the last 1:30 minutes of the game. It didn't matter, but that isn't normal. 

Watching Max Abmas sit at the scorers table for three straight bad offensive possessions (one bail out bucket) and Rodney Terry not call timeout was that of a hair pulling out event. 

I'll stop here because it's survive and advance, and Texas advanced to the Round of 32 for a third straight year. 

Game MVP

Chendall Weaver, hands down. His energy, toughness, aggressiveness and all out winners mentality was the difference tonight. That was especially true in the second half. He made key buckets in the last ten minutes of the game on individual ultra athletic plays. His ability to keep rising while maintaining body control through contact is very high-end. 

When Weaver makes plays on both ends of the floor, he becomes a difference maker on off shooting nights.