Horns go for fifth straight

I'd take an ugly win, too, and I expect any win to be a close one. As I mentioned on the Friday headline thread, the home/road point shift has averaged 11.5 for Texas against the four teams it has played twice this year (MU, KSU, ISU, A&M), with min of 8 and max of 15. That suggests a very tight game coming up.

Texas does APPEAR to be playing better, but I have recently come to wonder if that is truly the case, given results since the Temple game. The results suggest a team that can and will beat all but the best at home and compete on the road but come up short against quality competition there. OSU isn't quite at the level of ISU and KSU (though it seems to have talent to be), but I still have to think 9 - 11.5 = -1.5.

If Texas were to win with ease today, I will start to think there is more than an appearance of playing better. A win over Baylor in Austin, even by a narrow margin (which would be suggested by the 4 point loss in Waco), will convince me.

It will take a win against OSU on the road or Baylor at home to get us off of the bubble, assuming we beat who we should the rest of the way. I'd love to see us take this one.

I'm in Stillwater, ready to cheer on the Horns!

I think Texas finds a way today. They are getting better and it continues today.

This team could be special next year if Myck and JB return. Somehow I doubt that happens. Same old story.

I'll go a little more in depth why I wonder whether Texas is peaking. I have a sense it is playing better, but the more I look back at the entire conference season, the more I see a very simple pattern with nearly no deviation. Texas has played almost exactly according to conference pecking order:

Assuming Kansas beats Missouri in Lawrence and winds up on the top yet again, we are likely to see final standings (not including Texas) to appear like this

KU
MU
BU
ISU
KSU
OSU
A&M
OU
TT

Texas's performance both home and away to date nearly perfectly tracks those standings

KU--5 point loss at home, unplayed on road
MU--1 point loss at home, 11 point loss on road
BU--unplayed at home, 5 point loss on road
ISU--7 point win at home, 6 point loss on road
KSU--11 point win at home, 4 point loss on road
OSU--9 point win at home, unplayed on road
A&M--10 point win at home, 2 point win on road
OU--unplayed at home, 11 point win on road
TT--17 point win at home, unplayed on road

The deviations in that curve are nearly trivial. A couple of extra points against KSU in Austin. Maybe a couple of extra point against Baylor in Waco (or maybe ISU is actually a little better than Baylor). Road margin in Norman, but OU is playing hideously right now.

The fan in me says McClellan has really improved his game recently. The critic in me says Chapman has disappeared the last three games. The fan in me likes seeing Kabongo penetrate with more ease. The critic in me says the assist/turnover ratio in recent games is still bad.

The stat freak in me says this game in Stillwater and the Baylor game in Austin are the two points at which the lines approach zero. We've all known for a little time that these next two games are crucial. I guess I just gave you a table to show you how much so.

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3cst

Sagarin has a shows a home-away differential of 8 points across all the schools he tracks. I suspect that the differential increases during conference play and is larger for the power conferences . So 10 points is about the norm. I took a quick look at OSU; but the standard deviation was too large to be meaningful.

I tend to agree with Bierce on the question of how much we've improved as a team. The reality is that our conference schedule was front loaded with our toughest games, except for the closer at KU. The back-court is playing better; though I'm not convinced that OU's back-court didn't make Kabongo look better than he actually is playing. The problem is that the front court has disappeared except for the anomaly that Wangneme put up again KSU. Chapman needs to break out of his funk for us to be close to a complete team.

11 has been the benchmark for the last couple of weeks with an "up" arrow. It's in their own hands.

Television clearances for Saturday's Texas-Oklahoma State Men's Basketball game

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