Grading Texas Tech's Men Basketball vs. Missouri

Texas Tech 92 - Missouri 84

January 23, 2008 

7:00 PM

United Spirit Arena - Lubbock, Texas

"901! 901! 901!" - this is what the Tech student crowd screamed as the game clock expired; okay, not really, but with his Red Raider victory over the Missouri Tigers Bobby Knight won his 901st career game and his team improved to 11-7(2-2), tied for 5th in Big 12 play.

With that here is your review and breakdown of the Red Raider's each aspect of the game.

Offense:A

In their second highest scoring effort of the season the Red Raiders had to deal with Missouri's pesky press all but one possession with about three minutes left in the game.  Though the press did cause a few Tech turnovers, for the most part after Texas Tech got to the front-court they scored quickly and made most of their open shots shooting 26-46 (56.5%).  The Red Raiders also did a good job of playing aggressively and driving towards the basket in route to drawing thirty-one Mizzou fouls and an even fifty trips to the charity stripe.  Tech has finally learned how to play offense-the only problem is they can only do it in Lubbock; the Red Raiders need to get it going offensively on the road too.  Another thing that concerned me was that Texas Tech's bench was held scoreless and all five starters stayed in almost the entire game.  The bench play only consisted of five D'Walyn Robert minutes, two Trevor Cook minutes, and six Mike Singletary minutes; if this continues to happen than I believe stamina will start to become an issue.

Defense:C+

It may sound simple, but the Texas Tech men's basketball team needs to learn how to rebound the basketball.  The Red Raiders were out-rebounded twenty-three to thirty-six and allowed a ridiculous fifteen offensive rebounds to the Missouri Tigers.  Against the best teams in the nation the Red Raiders would not even have a fighting chance of being in the game if they rebounded like they have in their last three games.  The last game that the Red Raiders have led their opponent in rebounding was January 12 against Oklahoma State.  Since then, in the last three games the Red Raiders have been out-rebounded 100-69 by their opponents and surrendered 39 offensive rebounds.

Overall:B

The Texas Tech Red Raiders head to Austin this weekend to face #12 Texas on Saturday night.  The Red Raiders need to get some Big 12 wins on the road and this would be a very big win if they can beat the University of Texas; the team needs to stay confident and aggressive whether or not their crowd is there or not.