Longhorns Doomed by Turnovers in Big 12 Loss to West Virginia
The Texas Longhorns will have to head back to the drawing board -- and fast -- as they prepare for a rigorous Big 12 gauntlet.
Entering as 6.5-point favorites on the road, Saturday's meeting in Morgantown with the West Virginia Mountaineers appeared to be one of the more winnable games for Texas ahead of ranked matchups with Houston, Baylor, BYU and Oklahoma later this month.
Instead, the Longhorns failed to secure a much-needed win against a team that came into Saturday as the last-place team in the conference.
No. 25 Texas (12-4, 1-2) got a season-high 32 points from guard Max Abmas but were unable to overcome a season-worst 22 turnovers in a 76-73 loss. The Longhorns led by as many as three and never had control over a team that's rebuilding after losing Hall of Fame coach Bob Huggins in the offseason.
© Ben Queen, USA TODAY
It marked the first time West Virginia has beat Texas in Morgantown since 2010.
West Virginia (6-10, 1-2) picked up its first Big 12 win of the season thanks to a team-high 16 points from forward Patrick Suemnick. Kerr Kriisa (14 points), Raequan Battle (14 points) and Quinn Slazinski (13 point) all reached the double-digit scoring mark.
Texas forward Dylan Disu posted 18 points and six rebounds but was the only player outside of Abmas to reach double figures in scoring for the Longhorns.
Both teams were abysmal on offense through the first 10 minutes. The two sides had 18 combined turnovers by the 5:30 mark of the first half with Texas leading at 19-18.
Abmas kept Texas from falling into too cold of a spell with 10 first-half points but it was Suemnick's 11 points that led all scorers at halftime as West Virginia led 30-28 headed into the locker room.
The Mountaineers put together an 8-0 run early in the second half and eventually extended the lead to 52-46 with 9:20 to play. Despite sloppiness on both ends, Abmas and Disu kept the Longhorns in it but the latter eventually fouled out with 2:16 to play.
West Virginia built the lead up to as many as 11 with 5:45 to play. Abmas hit tough shot after tough shot to give Texas a chance, but in the end it wasn't enough.
The Longhorns will look to right the ship against UCF at home on Wednesday.
