Grant McCasland and the Texas Tech Red Raiders have plenty to be proud of Saturday night after the way the No. 16 team in the country just went on the road and upended the top-ranked team in the nation. The Texas Tech Red Raiders men’s basketball team just went to Arizona and upset the No. 1 Wildcats with an overtime win on Valentine’s Day.
JT Toppin was huge for Texas Tech as he led all scorers with his 16th double-double of the season as he managed to put up 31 points and grabbed 13 rebounds against the Wildcats. And because of how good Toppin was, Texas Tech has now won three in a row and just handed Arizona its first home loss of the season.
Texas Tech has now improved to 19-6 overall and 9-3 in Big 12 play while moving into a three-way tie for third place in the Big 12 standings.
No. 16 Texas Tech secures road win over No. 1 Arizona as the Red Raiders upset the Wildcats in overtime with a 3-point win
It is fascinating the way that the Red Raiders managed to slow down one of the most productive teams in the Big 12 (and also the country). The Wildcats entered this matchup scoring over 88 points per game while simultaneously holding foes to just over 68.2 points per game.Â
And Texas Tech really proved just how talented it was as the Red Raiders managed to score 78 points while holding the Wildcats to 75 points through overtime.
As already noted, Toppin deserves so much credit for the way he performed in this game and for the fact that he played 45 minutes on the road against the top team in the nation. But he wasn’t alone in having a solid game.
Christian Anderson scored 19 points and managed to hit on 6-of-15 from three point range. Along with that, he dished out eight assists and grabbed six rebounds. Anderson was crucial for Texas Tech in this game.
And then there’s Atwell, whose 11 points helped round things out for Texas Tech and provided the Red Raiders with some clear sparks on several occasions.
Texas Tech needed this win for a few different reasons.Â
Not only does this make things interesting for the Big 12 race down the stretch of the season, but also this showed just what sort of potential this team could have. It’s going to be interesting to see how this might impact NCAA Tournament seeding as the Red Raiders have managed to get impressive wins over Arizona, Duke, and Houston now.