Texas Tech basketball: How the Red Raiders beat the Mountaineers

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Forward TJ Holyfield #22 of the Texas Tech Red Raiders helps up guard Terrence Shannon Jr. #1 (Photo by John E. Moore III/Getty Images) /

Tech won the battle on the glass

Thought the 3-point shooting we saw from Tech (11-17 for the game) was phenomenal, Chris Beard said that his team’s ability to rebound was the stat of the night. After being dominated on the glass in Morgantown as WVU had 13 more boards, the Red Raiders handily won the rebounding battle on Wednesday.

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"“Obviously 3-point shooting was on our side tonight,” Beard said. “But to out-rebound West Virginia was probably the biggest stat of the game for us because it showed how we were competing, and gang-rebounding and we had a great night shooting the ball as well. We’ve got a lot of respect for that team and I just told the guys that it was a great win. When we beat a team that’s that good, it’s a good win.”"

Dominating the Big 12’s top rebounding team 32-23, the Red Raiders surprised just about everyone in the arena. Much of that was due to the fact that WVU big man Derek Culver spent a considerable portion of the game on the bench with foul trouble but it was a far more aggressive and purposeful effort on the glass by the Red Raiders than we saw earlier this month.

No Mountaineer had more than four rebounds. Meanwhile, four Red Raiders had at least five. Advantage Tech.

"“We talked about it a lot and practiced a lot,” Moretti said. “Their identity is rebounding and our biggest keys are to match our opponent’s toughness, but today I think we out-toughed them on the rebound battle.”"

Next. The all-decade point guards. dark

In the end, Tech was going to have to match the toughness of bigger Big 12 teams to start to win. That’s why Wednesday’s rebounding battle was such an encouraging development on Wednesday. Hopefully, that travels with the team to Lawrence this weekend.

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