Texas Tech basketball: Unsung heroes from Red Raiders' win in Austin

Chance McMillan gives Texas Tech a boost off the bench

One of the nice developments on Saturday night was that Tech's reserves outscored UT's 20-11. Each team played only three bench players and thanks to Red Raider guard Chance McMillan, McCasland's team got much more of a punch from its group of backups.

Scoring 11 points overall, McMillan had one of his more subtly impactful games of the year. He was 3-6 from the field and 2-4 from 3-point range to go along with five rebounds in 28 minutes of action.

On a night when starting guard Kerwin Walton was essentially a ghost with no points and only two rebounds, Tech needed McMillan to be effective and that's what he was. Along the way, he made some of the biggest plays of the game.

With Tech clinging to a 52-51 second-half lead, McMillan drained a corner 3-ball to extend his team's lead at the 11:46 mark. Then, he turned in what might have been the play of the night, a breakaway dunk with 2:24 to play to extend his team's lead to 73-63. That play allowed him to show off the type of athleticism that we hadn't seen much of from the Grand Canyon transfer thus far.

McMillan has put together five double-digit scoring games in a row now and he's figured out exactly what this team needs from him. He is Tech's best weapon off the bench and against Texas, he helped give the Red Raiders enough scoring to take down the No. 20 team in the country.