Tubby Smith Not Happy With His Team’s Effort as Texas Tech Loses to Oklahoma

The Oklahoma Sooners took advantage Texas Tech Red Raider missed shots and points off turnovers en route to a 74-65 win on Saturday at the United Spirit Arena.

The Sooners had three players score in double figures with Buddy Hield leading the way with 18 points. Cameron Clark scored 17 points and Jordan Woodard scored 15 points. Woodard went 3/3 from behind the arc and Hield was 4/7 on his three-pointers.

Oklahoma scored 14 points off turnovers, 12 second-chance points and forced 11 turnovers in their win.

Meanwhile, for Texas Tech, Jaye Crockett and Jordan Tolbert both scored 14 points each.  Poor shooting from the field hurt the Red Raiders in the first half as Tech shot 34.5% from the field while the Sooners went 50%.

Oklahoma shot out to a 21-9 lead at the 10:35 mark of the first half and they went to halftime with a 38-29 lead.

Throughout the game, the Sooners alternated between a two-man press and half-court trap to cause the Red Raiders problems when they were bringing the ball into the front court.  Texas Tech head coach Tubby Smith was asked if was surprised the trapping caused his team problems, "Yeah, cause we worked on it (in practice). All we had to do was pass the ball and not jump up into the air and throw it away.  Everyone turned it over at some point in time except Jamal Williams and Alex Foster," Smith said.

Coach Smith said Foster played "outstanding" against the Sooners and he earned more playing time. Foster, a 6'8" freshman, had 8 points on 4 of 8 shooting with 8 rebounds in 14 minutes of playing time.

Smith elaborating on Foster, "He played hard. He played harder than anyone else. He and Jamal Williams that's why stood out because they played harder than the rest of the guys that played (for Texas Tech). It's as simple as that."

Smith was asked a follow-up question about Dejan Kravic and getting him 'going again'. Kravic had three points and five rebounds in 19 minutes of action. "I just said there was only two guys that played hard," Smith said. "That kinda answers the question about Dejan and the rest of them."

In the second half, Texas Tech cut Oklahoma's lead down to four two separate times, but they were unable to get any closer as OU used good shooting from the field to hold on to their lead.

With the loss, Texas Tech's record drops to (10-10, 2-5) and into eighth place in the Big 12 Conference.  Oklahoma's record improved to (16-4, 5-2).

Texas Tech's next game is Tuesday at Kansas State.