Saturday night in Tucson, Arizona, the Texas Tech basketball team lost for the first time in almost a month when the Red Raiders fell to the Arizona Wildcats 82-73. Though the Red Raiders hung around and kept the game close for most of the evening before running out of steam late, it was a thorough and complete victory for the home team.
"Arizona was more physical than us in every way," Texas Tech head coach Grant McCasland said after the game. "I mean, just the way they pushed it in transition, the way they got it into the paint and scored it at the basket through us, the way they bullied us with their defense of pushing all the catches out, their activity on the ball, their physicality in rebounding, their offensive rebounding, and scoring in the paint. They basically...beat us in every area."
While McCasland is correct in that Arizona was better in just about every aspect of the game, what is most concerning for Texas Tech fans is that the Wildcats exposed what might be the Red Raiders' fatal flaw this season.
The difference in this game was the physicality and dominance that Arizona exerted in the paint. That is where the home team set the tone and where time and again the Wildcats went to keep the Red Raiders at bay. Arizona outscored the Red Raiders 48-28 in the paint and won the rebounding battle 42-29.
Tech is one of the smaller teams in major college basketball. The eight-man rotation that McCasland relies on has only one player, Federiko Federiko, over 6-foot-8. Sure, starting forward JT Toppin is listed at 6-foot-9 but in reality, he's closer to 6-foot-7, which is what he measured at last year's NBA Draft combine.
Additionally, Toppin and Federiko are both lanky players. Neither weighs over 225 pounds and both struggle when matched up against heavier and more physical post players as was the case on Saturday night.
Arizona featured 6-foot-8, 250-pound Tobe Awaka and 7-foot, 225-pound Henri Veesaar in the paint and that duo absolutely owned the Red Raiders. Awaka went for 14 points, 11 rebounds, and two blocks while Veesaar gave his team 15 points, eight rebounds, and two blocks as they simply beat up Toppin and Federiko.
That continues a concerning trend of big, physical post players feasting on the Red Raiders. Though Tech escaped Houston with a one-point win just eight days ago, in that game, 6-foot-8, 235-pound Houston forward J'Wan Roberts posted 18 points and seven rebounds.
A few games prior, Iowa State's 6-foot-9, 240-pound Joshua Jefferson scored 17 points and grabbed eight rebounds in his team's one-point overtime win in Lubbock. That came one game after BYU's 6-foot-8, 240-pound backup forward Fousseyni Traore scored 14 points and grabbed five boards against Tech in Provo.
For the most part, Tech has been able to survive against teams that have one active and physical big man. However, Arizona's duo of Awaka and Veesaar proved to be too much to handle on Saturday.
"Sure enough, if you saw anything that first half, I thought they were just bullying us at the basket and that is a bad feeling," McCasland said. "And until you can match that, and stare it in the face and know that you need to compete with that, it's difficult."
For what it's worth, Toppin competed well against the Arizona bigs. He scored 21 points and pulled down 13 rebounds in 30 minutes of action.
However, Federiko was more than a non-factor, he was an absolute liability off the bench. Playing 14 minutes, he scored no points, grabbed no rebounds, and blocked no shots all while committing four fouls.
This team simply isn't built to overcome outings like that from its primary backup big, especially against teams with elite size like Arizona. That left many wondering if McCasland should have turned to 6-foot-8, 240-pound sophomore Eemeli Yalaho for some minutes. After the game, McCasland did say that he should have gone further into the bench with his subsition patterns however he didn't specify what he meant by that nor did he mention Yalaho by name.
It will be interesting to see if Yalaho does get some opportunities moving forward. Though he is raw, especially on the offensive end, he does have enough bulk to provide some resistance in the paint against heavier players.
Regardless of how McCasland addresses this issue, though, one thing is certain, if the Red Raiders hope to make a deep run in the postseason, they are going to have to figure out how to compete at a higher level against teams that have size in the paint. That's because what we saw from them on Saturday in Arizona simply won't cut it.