January 30, 2008
Texas A&M's confidence was sagging after a tough start to Big 12 play.
Nothing like a win over archrival Texas to get things back on track.
Josh Carter scored 19 points and No. 23 Texas A&M cruised to an easy 80-63 win over No. 10 Texas on Wednesday night.
Carter, who had 10 rebounds, has scored at least 10 points in 15 straight games. He helped A&M break a three-game winning streak for Texas (16-4, 3-2 Big 12) and continue a four-year tradition of the home team winning in this series.
"This helps a lot ," Carter said of the win. "I think some of us lost some confidence with the losses."
A&M's Big 12 performance before Wednesday included a 21-point loss to then unranked Kansas State and a tough five overtime home defeat by Baylor a week ago. The Aggies squeaked by Oklahoma State on Saturday before coming home to face the Longhorns.
"I couldn't be more proud of our team," Texas A&M coach Mark Turgeon said. "To think where we were a week ago, the world was coming to the end. It was good to bounce back."
The Longhorns played the Aggies even in the second half but it wasn't enough to overcome a poor first half where Texas made just 9-of-30 shots and at times seemed off-balance and confused. Texas A&M (17-4, 3-3) shot 64 percent in the first half to make the Longhorns' lackluster offensive start even more difficult to overcome.
Texas never led in this one, trailed by as many as 22 points in the first half and shot 34 percent.
The Aggies led 46-28 at halftime.
"There was no point in time that I think we guarded them," Texas coach Rick Barnes said. "We didn't deserve to win that one in any shape, form or fashion."
D.J. Augustin's 3-pointer with about nine minutes left got Texas within 59-48 before this fast-paced game was slowed down by a wild series of events on the next possession.
The already emotionally charged rivalry got even more amped up on a play that began with Augustin being knocked to the floor when he ran into a screen by Bryan Davis and ended when Alexis Wangmene threw an elbow into the back of DeAndre Jordan while the pair fought for a rebound. Wangmene then crashed to the court into a group of cameramen.
Wangmene was given a flagrant technical foul for the hit and ejected from the game. When the replay was shown on the Jumbotron, the record crowd of 13,555 began to boo and hiss menacingly. After his ejection, Wangmene sat at the end of the bench, causing the referees to approach the bench and make him leave the court with a police escort.
Barnes said he didn't see the hit.
"I don't know," he said. "I think both teams were playing hard."
Turgeon downplayed the incident.
"I don't know if it was as bad as it seemed," he said. "These kind of games it's going to be testy and I thought we handled it well."
Texas cut the lead to 11 points two times after that, but would get no closer and the Aggies got the redeeming win.
Joseph Jones and Dominique Kirk scored 14 points each.
A&M led by 22 points with 1:06 left when Turgeon sat all his starters, drawing a standing ovation from the crowd.
Dexter Pittman and Augustin lead the Longhorns with 14 points apiece.
The Longhorns opened the second half with an 8-2 run to get within 48-35 with about 16 minutes left. The Aggies had soon pushed the lead back to 17 points after a layup by Kirk with about 11 minutes left.
Jordan was dazzling offensively as usual with his crowd pleasing dunks, but on this night he was also solid on defense. He took a charge by Pittman with about 12 minutes left in the second half that gave Pittman his fourth foul. Teammate Davis was so excited about it he affectionately slapped him on the head several times, finally drawing a funny look and a 'that hurt' from the freshman 7-footer.
Jordan had 10 points and Davis finished with nine.
The Longhorns made just two of their first 13 shots and had five turnovers in the first 10 minutes to help the Aggies build a 29-7 lead. Carter made three 3-pointers in that span to lead Texas A&M.
"They came out hot and made a lot of shots and we didn't play very good defense," Augustin said. "That was the key of the game. We didn't play defense, so you're not going to win like that."
Postgame Quotes & Notes
Texas A&M Head Coach Mark Turgeon:
?I thought we were really good beginning to end. The Defense was fantastic. They missed some shots, but I thought we had something to do with that. I couldn?â„¢t be more proud of our team. With the way these kids have bounced back, I?â„¢m proud of them. Hopefully we will stay humble and continue to practice hard. We executed our defensive gameplan for 39 minutes tonight. At A&M it?â„¢s big to beat Texas, but it?â„¢s a long season. When you play from November to March you?â„¢re going to have stretches when you don?â„¢t play well. We had one of those stretches. Hopefully it?â„¢s our only one. This is why you coach. With what?â„¢s happened the last three weeks, tonight was great.
It?â„¢s nice to have a crowd like that. That was something special. The crowd brought a great energy. Hopefully, they?â„¢ll bring that the rest of the way. We?â„¢re going to need it.
Our bench was better tonight and that helps. We haven?â„¢t been a deep team recently. I don?â„¢t want to talk about us being a young team anymore. We?â„¢re too far along. Our sophomore class is grown up. They?â„¢re ready. You could see DeAndre grow up during the game.?
Texas A&M Senior Guard Dominique Kirk:
?We played hard. We knew it was going to be a big game defensively. We haven?â„¢t been playing good defensively. We just wanted to stay in front of D.J. (Augustin). The scouting report was great and we executed.?
Texas A&M Junior Guard Josh Carter:
?We wanted to come out aggressive. It felt good to knock down some shots. Nothing has been wrong mechanically lately, the shots just weren?â„¢t falling. It feels good to play well. Hopefully, we?â„¢ll be ready to go Saturday.?
Texas A&M Senior Forward Joseph Jones:
?Coach said get the ball down low early and go to work. We got our confidence back.?
Texas Head Coach Rick Barnes:
?They played great. I told them you might not win a game in the first ten minutes, but you might lose it. At no point did I think we guarded them. We didn?â„¢t deserve to win. They deserve all the credit. They came out tonight and had their way. When we had to make some plays, we didn?â„¢t.?
Texas Sophomore Guard D.J. Augustin:
They came out hot and made a lot of shots. We didn?â„¢t play good defense tonight. That was the key to the game. They played good defense as a team. It was tough for anybody to get open. It wasn?â„¢t fun for us.?
A&M NOTES
*Tonight?â„¢s attendance of 13,555 was the largest in Texas A&M history. The previous mark was 13,203 last year against Missouri
*A&M has won four straight against the Longhorns at Reed Arena. Texas has been ranked all four years, including three top-10 rankings.
*A&M has won 37 of its last 39 home games and is 14-1 at Reed Arena this season.
*Tonight?â„¢s win was A&M?â„¢s first against a top-10 ranked team since last year?â„¢s 69-66 win against No. 6 Kansas in Lawrence.
*The Aggies have posted 10 wins against ranked teams in the last four seasons, including four against top-10 teams.
*Mark Turgeon?â„¢s 17-4 start is the best by a first-year coach in A&M history. Tonight?â„¢s win was the 170th (170-123) in his 10-year career.
*Dominique Kirk extended his Big 12 record with his 117th straight start. Kirk scored 14 points, his third straight game in double figures.
*Josh Carter scored 19 points and tied his career high with 10 rebounds. It was his third career double double and his second in the last three games. Carter has scored in double figures in 15 straight games.
*Joseph Jones scored 14 points, his 10th straight game in double figures.
*DeAndre Jordan scored 10 points with 5 rebounds, his first double-figure scoring game wince he had 14 in the Big 12 opener against Colorado.
*A&M had a 39-38 rebounding edge and has out-rebounded its opponent in all 17 wins.
*A&M had a 36-22 advantage in points in the paint. The Aggies have had at least 20 points in the paint in all 17 wins.
*A&M has had more free throw attempts than its opponent in all 17 wins.
*Texas?â„¢ D.J. Augustin scored 14 points, his fewest since Nov. 18, when he had 9 vs. Arkansas-Monticello.
*Texas?â„¢ A.J. Abrams scored 8 points, his third fewest of the season.
*Texas?â„¢ Damion James scored 4 points, tying his season low (Tennessee). James also had 7 rebounds, his fewest since he had 6 against Tennessee.