Longhorns Throttle Oklahoma on Senior Day as Big 12 Tournament Awaits
AUSTIN -- The Texas Longhorns exited Waco on Monday with a few different sour tastes in their mouth, but there was a different buzz entering Senior Day on Saturday at home against the rival Oklahoma Sooners.
Dylan Disu (left knee sprain) and Brock Cunningham (broken thumb) both sustained worrisome injuries in the loss to Baylor, but got the start against OU and combined to score Texas' first five points. From there, the Longhorns never trailed and never looked back
Tyrese Hunter went on a second-half eruption and scored a career-high 30 points as Texas (20-11, 9-9 Big 12) powered past the Sooners (20-11, 8-10 Big 12) in a convincing wire-to-wire, 94-80 win to close out the regular season while "OU Sucks" chants rang out from the home crowd in the final seconds.
© Scott Wachter, USA TODAY
Despite entering Saturday as a game-time decision, Disu looked healthy and finished with 16 points and six rebounds. Dillon Mitchell added 14 points off the bench while Max Abmas (11 points) and Chendall Weaver (nine points) both had key contributions from the backcourt. Along with his career-high scoring day, Hunter was 9 of 9 from the free throw line and had seven assists.
In his final home game as a Longhorn, Cunningham finished with six points, five rebounds and six assists.
Texas had an all-around efficient day on offense. The Longhorns shot 63 percent from the field (33 of 52), 50 percent from deep (6 of 12) and 96 percent from the foul line (22 of 23).
The Sooners got a team-high 21 points from Rivaldo Soares, who had to be helped off the court late in the second half. Jalon Moore had a big game with 16 points and nine rebounds while Milos Uzan (12 points, seven assists) and Le'Tre Darthard (10 points) both had double-digit scoring efforts.
Oklahoma standout guard and leading scorer Javian McCollum struggled on Saturday, finishing with just five points on 2 of 6 shooting.
Despite some turnovers and far-from-perfect defense, the Longhorns jumped out to an 18-10 lead at the 9:18 mark after Hunter found Mitchell for a lob dunk in transition off a steal.
The Sooners answered with back-to-back triples from Soares and
Luke Northweather, which helped spark a 7-0 run to tie the game at 20-20, but steady scoring from the field and the foul line by Disu kept OU from taking its first lead of the half.
Texas ramped up the defense and held Oklahoma scoreless for 2:20 while putting together a 6-0 run. McCollum hit a late triple for the Sooners, their fifth of the first half, but the Longhorns headed into halftime with a 40-35 lead.
Soares and Disu both had a game-high 12 points at the half. The Longhorns shot 54 percent from the field, but benefited from going 10 of 11 at the foul line.
The Longhorns burst out of the gates to start the second half with an 8-0 run to build their largest lead of 13 at 48-35.
Hunter started getting into a rhythm and scored nine of 11 points during an 11-2 run. He converted a tough and-one layup before hitting back-to-back triples. This gave Texas its new largest lead of 19 at 61-42 with 13:39 to play.
The Longhorns started getting a bit too comfortable as Oklahoma quickly went on an 14-4 run to cut the lead to 11 with under six minutes to play. Despite the momentum shift, the Longhorns stayed steady, as Hunter nailed another triple to push the lead back up to 14 prior to the under-4 timeout.
Abmas and Hunter put the finishing touches on the win with a late 7-0 run.
The Longhorns will now await to see who their opponent is for the first round of the Big 12 Tournament in Kansas City.
