No. 25 Texas earned another important home win on Saturday afternoon as the Longhorns topped No. 3 Oklahoma, 76-63, in Big 12 play. The win is the third this season for Texas over a top-10 opponent at home as they’ve also defeated North Carolina and West Virginia as Shaka Smart has already made his new home a tough place to play in the first season.
The Longhorns (19-10, 10-6) ended the game on a 25-5 run and just looked like the fresher team down the stretch as five players finished in double-figures, led by Isaiah Taylor’s 18 points. Texas has recovered with two wins now since the home letdown against Baylor and they get another top-5 target in Kansas coming into Austin next week. Entering the Big 12 tournament, Texas has a chance to make a major statement within the league while also improving their NCAA tournament profile with that game.
Five of Oklahoma’s six losses have been Big 12 road games this season, and they looked tired down the stretch. As a jump-shooting team, the Sooners just didn’t have a lot of consistent help outside of Player of the Year candidate Buddy Hield. Oklahoma was led by 33 points from Hield while Jordan Woodard had 15 points but they didn’t shoot particularly well and a lot of jumpers were coming up short.
Texas certainly deserves credit for its defense being solid but Oklahoma only shot 37 percent (23-for-61) from the field and 35 percent (10-for-28) from 3-point range. With Hield scoring 23 of his points in the first half, the Sooners’ offense didn’t have a lot of positives going in the final 20 minutes.
Oklahoma still has a tough home game against Baylor and a road game against TCU but hopefully they can rest up a bit for the postseason because they don’t have the same look of a No. 1 seed as they did a few weeks ago.