Texas Basketball: 3 keys to Longhorns downing No. 17 Kansas Jayhawks
1. The key cogs of Kansas’ offense, the Longhorns’ big men will need to shut down McCormack or Wilson inside
Arguably, no players have been more crucial to the Jayhawks’ offense as of late than David McCormack and Jalen Wilson. During Kansas’ five-game win-streak, Wilson is averaging 14.2 points and 10.4 rebounds – while McCormack is recording marks of 14.6 points and 7.2 boards. Most recently, the pair is coming off double-digit performances against Texas Tech, with McCormack tallying 17 and Wilson providing 11 points.
To showcase just how crucial McCormack and Wilson are to Kansas’ offense: both are the only players on the Jayhawks’ roster to, when they are on the floor, be involved in over 20% of Kansas’ possessions. Additionally, with the exception of Ochai Agbaji, no player takes a higher percentage of Kansas’ shots when they are in than those two – with McCormack ranking 88th in the country at 29.8%.
Shutting both posts down is, obviously, a difficult task to undertake – but locking down one would be greatly beneficial by itself. When these two teams met last time, that is just what happened – Wilson went off for a game-high 20 points, but McCormack was held scoreless from the floor, scoring just eight points – with all eight coming from the charity stripe.
Texas’ collection of big men – Greg Brown, Kai Jones, and Jericho Sims – will have their hands full, but they have shown they can be mildly successful against posts as of late. Against West Virginia, the Longhorns held Derek Culver – arguably, the best post in the Big 12 – to 14 points on 4-9 shooting. The issue, however, is that they allowed Culver to make 11 trips to the free-throw line.
The Longhorns have been effective in locking teams down inside, having held WVU to just 14 points inside the paint while scoring 34 themselves – but Texas was much less effective in the second half, outscoring the Mountaineers, 8-4, in the stanza. The Jayhawks, meanwhile, are coming off a game where they outscored Texas Tech, 24-14, in points in the paint.
The Jayhawks are shooting 50.4% in Big 12 play on two-pointers – the fourth-highest mark in conference play. The Longhorns, meanwhile, are holding teams to just 47.1% – fifth in the Big 12 – but nearly 3% worse than what they are holding teams to nationally. The difference in Texas’ play from non-conference to conference play is incredibly striking – and they must return to the Texas of old in order to shut down either – or both – of McCormack and Wilson.