Five Thoughts on TCU’s 90-70 Pounding of Oklahoma State

BOX SCORE

Oklahoma State got walloped on Saturday night by the TCU Horned Frogs 90-70 in Ft. Worth, Texas to touch off a two-loss week. After getting off to a hot start to start the game — TCU went 0 for 9 out of the gate — the Pokes got throttled in the second half, and the Frogs touched off another football-basketball sweep of the Cowboys (OSU went 0-6 against purple Big 12 teams in football and basketball).

FINAL: TCU 90, #OKState 70

TCU shoots 62.1 percent in the second half, burying the Cowboys and, in all likelihood, their NCAA Tournament hopes.

— Nathan Ruiz (@NathanSRuiz) February 18, 2018

Kendall Smith led the Pokes with 21 points on 7 of 18 shooting, and Mitchell Solomon added 13 points and 5 boards despite playing most of the game in foul trouble. For TCU, everyone scored. The Frogs averaged 1.3 points per possession (which is awful if you’re OSU!) and all five starters were in double figures.

For the fourth game in a row and fifth time in six games, OSU allowed a team to shoot better than 50 percent from the field (TCU shot 54 percent). OSU again took more shots than its opponent but connected on 9 fewer and shot just 37 percent from the field.

Five thoughts on the game.

1. Shots in the paint

Both teams were bent on getting to the bucket, but only one (TCU) did it well. The Frogs moved the ball well and ran more cuts than a Sheryl Crow album. On the flip side, OSU didn’t defend the lane.

I saw some chatter on Twitter that OSU should have gone zone to force TCU out of the paint, but TCU is the best 3-point shooting team in the Big 12 so I’m not sure that was prudent. The biggest problem (more on this in a minute) is that OSU’s bigs got into loads of foul trouble. That inhibited them on both ends and meant you had the Tavarius Shines and Jeffrey Carrolls trying to carry the load defensively. Not ideal.

OSU has been overwhelmed on defense of late as the season wears on — four of its eight games giving up a 50-percent shooting night to an opponent have come in February. When the Pokes aren’t just absolutely lights out offensively, 20-point losses are the result.

2. Get to the lane, Clip

I loved Carroll getting into the lane, and I don’t really think he did it enough. He still took too many 3-pointers (0 for 3 from deep) and didn’t use his size and length to his advantage. He’s had a frustrating year at times on offense, and it seems like a lot of that could be solved by him creating his own offense off the dribble. Is that always possible? No, but when it is, he should take advantage.

Kendall Smith, who is far smaller than Carroll, is really skilled in this area. Half the time when he gets into the lane, I think, “that really looks like Carroll.” The other half of the time I think, “that really looks like something Carroll should do.”

3. Big Men Foul Trouble

Three of OSU’s bigs had 3 fouls at halftime, and by the 12-minute mark in the second half, here’s how the foul situation looked for the Pokes.

Cam McGriff: 4
Yankuba Sima: 4
Mitchell Solomon: 3
Lucas N’Guessan: 3

Little Country was doing yoga behind the bench to get prepped for the stretch run. And with TCU cutting and tearing up the lane like they were, OSU needed some of those big bodies to stop the bleeding. Unfortunately, one fouled out and the rest were rendered ineffective. Aside: It felt like there were more than 26 fouls called on OSU.

4. Second half start

I should probably go back and do the math on this at some point (even though it would take forever), but I’d love to see the splits between OSU in the first five minutes of the first half against OSU in the first five minutes of the second half (then do the same stat for football).

They are the college Warriors in the first five of the first half and an A-league intramural semifinalist in the first five of the second. They hit another patch of ice in the second and didn’t make a field goal for over 4:30. I’ve said this around 2,394 times this year, but their defense isn’t feisty enough to sustain stretches like that, and they continue to prove it in a variety of situations.

5. Smith kept them in it (as much as they were in it)

Smith was unbelievable in the second half. His splits looked like this.

1st half: 7 points (3-9 on FG, 1-2 from 3)
2nd half: 14 points (4-9 on FG, 3-5 from 3)

And all of his 3s were from virtually the same spot in the corner. He’s been mostly outstanding since getting benched early in the Big 12 slate, and he was again on Saturday against the Frogs. Of OSU’s 34 second-half points on Saturday, Smith had 14 of them.

Other notes on Oklahoma State’s loss on Saturday.

• I love TCU’s red 3-point line. That’s some elite design work and a subtle touch I’m sure their fans appreciate. I believe the yard line on their goal line is also red.

• McGriff gets a little out of control sometimes. I love him, but he has to know his limits. He gets both out over his skis and a little worked up about silly things that you can’t get worked up about.

• On the other hand, I’m here for all the Crime Dog trash talk.

• OSU had some truly awful turnovers.

• How many CBB games do you think have been called this year without Trae Young being mentioned? What about Big 12 games? Probably 70 percent of CBB games have mentioned Young and 100 percent of Big 12 games. Are those fair numbers?

• Pretty impressive stuff.

Jeffrey Carroll just grabbed an offensive board to set up a Kendall Smith 3-pointer.

That rebound makes Carroll the 14th player in #okstate history to rank in the program's top 25 in both scoring and rebounding.

— Nathan Ruiz (@NathanSRuiz) February 18, 2018

• One of my low-key favorite things is when Boynton doesn’t like a call and grabs his face with both hands in disbelief. It’s fantastic.

• I enjoy watching Scott Sutton during OSU possessions. High entertainment value.

• What a stat.

Thomas Dziagwa misses a free throw for the first time in his career.

— Mark Cooper (@mark_cooperjr) February 18, 2018

• The double technical in the second half on Smith and TCU’s guard was the weakest call in the history of college basketball. If that’s the threshold, there are some Big 8 players who would have been thrown in jail!