Rush The Court

RTC will be providing coverage of the NCAA Tournament from start to finish. Matt Patton (@pattonm08) is in Boston for the East Regional this weekend.

Three Key Takeaways.

1. Texas Tech is deep. The Red Raiders outscored Purdue’s bench 33-6 tonight. Four players wound up in double figures, and Niem Stevenson had nine of those points. For most of the game All-American Keenan Evans was ineffective (he was 1-of-6 from the field at the under-eight media timeout in the second half), but Texas Tech remained in control. Somehow he still ended up Texas Tech’s leading scorer, but his points mostly served to maintain rather than build the lead. In contrast to the injury-hampered Boilermakers, only Evans finished with more than 30 minutes. That bodes well for the quick turnaround coming before Sunday.
2. Carsen Edwards versus Jalen Brunson was the matchup we’ll never get to see. With the rest of his team ineffective and hesitant, Edwards was poetry in motion tonight. He finished with 30 points on 20 shots and, amazingly, only one turnover. Edwards has a nose for the ball and like Brunson always finds a way to carve up double-teams. Edwards kept the Boilermakers within striking distance until the last five minutes of the game when an 11-0 Red Raiders run sealed it. The backup matchup of Brunson and Evans should still be must-see basketball, but their styles of play are much more distinct.
3. Injuries bite. Without Isaac Haas, Purdue had no viable inside presence to combat Texas Tech with tonight. Matt Haarms and Vincent Edwards were non-factors. Edwards’ four offensive boards were more than cancelled out by his six turnovers. Haas’ absence hurt Purdue’s presence on the defensive boards and probably contributed to the team’s turnovers. Without being able to play inside-out, the offense sputtered for long stretches at a time. After the game, Purdue head coach Matt Painter noted, “Empty possessions really hurt us where we weren’t getting a shot at all, and that was probably the hardest thing for us, where they were getting in transition, getting the layups and the dunks.” In addition to dominating the bench points, Texas Tech owned a 15-2 advantage in points off turnovers. Had Purdue not hit nearly 40 percent of its threes this evening, this game could have been incredibly ugly.

Stars of the Game: Justin Gray and Zhaire Smith played like stars in finishing a combined 13-of-18 from the field for 26 points and 12 boards (five offensive) collectively. They’ll need to continue their excellence on Sunday and Beard will need a lot out of Gray in particular against Villanova’s more intact frontline.

Quotable. 

• When asked about taking Texas Tech to its first Elite Eight, Chris Beard replied: “So I respect the tradition, but when questions are asked like that, I’ve only coached these guys for two years. To me, we just made the — what’s it called? The Great Eight?”

Sights and Sounds: After the final horn sounds, winning teams typically celebrate by playing their fight song or alma mater. Most of the time this feels like a perfunctory formality as part of the end of the game, but for Texas Tech the moment tonight carried much more significance. The team joined a redshirt player in the stands as the band launched into the Matador Song. This is Texas Tech’s first trip in school history to the Elite Eight, and the anticipation was in their fan section the whole night.

What’s Next. Texas Tech faces off against Villanova in the Elite Eight on Sunday afternoon. The Red Raiders will get an opponent that doesn’t play a very deep rotation coming off an exhausting win against West Virginia. Of course Villanova is also probably the best team in the country. Chris Beard’s biggest challenge might actually be containing freshman big man Omari Spellman, though, as his team is clearly lacking in size.