10 Thoughts: Texas

BOX SCORE

1. I’m out of adjectives for Smart. He owns games. He had 23 points, 7 boards, 5 steals, 3 assists, and 2 blocks. Tossed in 7 turnovers but only two after halftime.

One moment stood out to me today ( a strange one at that). Near the end of the game, he got crossed over pretty badly, but recoverd and somehow reached behind the guy who crossed him and swiped it back off the guy’s foot and into Smart’s hands. He just never gives up on anything. Reid Gettys added a “very few people catch well with their feet” after Texas booted it. Glad he’s here.

2. Great point here.

Just a reminder…Marcus and Phil won 5A Texas state titles in this building the last 2 years. This might as well be a home game. #okstate

— Nolan (@nolancox) February 9, 2013

3. I can’t get over how much better OSU’s half court sets have looked the last three or four games. I don’t know if it’s because people are moving better or Smart is opening things up but man, the offense has been incredible.

The stats back me up too: after the OU game OSU had the 90th most efficient offense in the country, coming into today it was 54th and it’s hard to see them dropping much with the way they played today.

4. Texas cannot score. I realize that’s partly a function of OSU playing great defense, but 6% from three-point range is unspeakable. I thought Ford really used the zone effectively again as well (which he’s been great at in conference play). He threw it out in the first half and put Texas on ice for about eight minutes. Slater noticed it as well.

Good move by Ford going to the zone. Texas is one of the worst shooting teams in the nation.

— Anthony Slater (@anthonyVslater) February 9, 2013

5. Haha this is true. Forte is 46% from three in home/neutral games and 11% in road games.

If he shot, say, 30% from three on the road, he’d be at 41% on the year. As it is, he’s hovering around 35% for the season. Bummer.

https://twitter.com/okc_dave/status/300318846370340865

6. Kamari Murphy, come on down. Five points, six boards, a steal, a block and his on-court awareness is really underrated for a freshman. I get tingly when I think about the pieces OSU has around Smart and Markel for a postseason run. We need to move on.

7. Am I a bad person for being in love with Texas’ uniforms? Because I am. I’m also not totally in love with the all-orange OSU look. It’s not subtle, I like subtle. One more uni note: I’m pretty positive Dan Bailey stripped the spikes off his football cleats and sent them to Le’Bryan to wear today.

8. Speaking of Forte, he needs to get better at driving and pulling jumpers or driving for layups. He did it once today and it was good, but he needs to do it more. People are realizing that all he’s going to do is pull from deep. Keiton needs to teach him the “twist your body so 6’10 guys can’t swat your layup” move. Soon.

9. Indeed. All of the sixth streets for OSU tonight.

Ford needs to take Marcus Smart to 6th street, have Forte photoshop incriminating photos & blackmail Marcus for his sophomore year. #okstate

— Carson Cunningham (@KOCOCarson) February 9, 2013

10. Amazing stat here.

#OKstate with more Big 12 road wins in the past seven days than it had in the previous two years.

— Anthony Slater (@anthonyVslater) February 9, 2013

at Tech on Wednesday.