Texas Tech basketball: How the Red Raiders beat the Mountaineers

T.J. Holyfield completely outplayed Oscar Tshiebwe

When T.J. Holyfield played the Mountaineers for the first time this year, he had no points and one rebound.  Meanwhile, WVU freshman forward Oscar Tshiebwe had a massive 17-rebound game to go along with seven points and four blocked shots.

But on Wednesday, the script was flipped and it was Holyfield that made a huge impact while WVU’s leading scorer and rebounder was invisible.  That’ proved to be a huge factor.

Tech was happy to get 11 points four rebounds and four blocks from Holyfield.  In fact, he played one of his best games of the year thanks to his aggressiveness and energy.

Meanwhile, Tshiebwe scored just four points and had three rebounds.  Coming into the game, he was averaging nearly 12 points and 10 boards per game.

It was the type of effort against an elite big man that we’ve been waiting to see from Holyfield all year.  He hit 4-7 shots, including his lone 3-point attempt, while being as active on the glass as we’ve seen all year.

One more than one occasion, he helped keep possessions alive by tapping a rebound out to a teammate, something that won’t show up in the box score but which was indicative of the impact he had.  That’s important because of the fact that Tech now heads into another game against a team with elite size, Kansas.  The T.J. Holyfield we saw on Wednesday has to be the one that shows up Saturday as well.