Houston's defense suffocates BYU, advances to Big 12 championship game
Two of the hottest teams in college basketball met in the semifinals of the Big 12 Tournament on Friday evening when No. 2 Houston took on No. 17 BYU.
It was all Houston all game, as the Cougars from Texas took down the Cougars from Provo 74-54. Houston more than proved why it will be a No. 1 seed come Sunday.
All-Big 12 First-Team selection, LJ Cryer, opened the scoring for Houston to go up 2-0. He then hit a 3-pointer to make it 5-0. In the blink of an eye it was 15-0 Houston.
BYU did not score a bucket until Dawson Baker hit a jumper six minutes and 47 seconds into the game.
Houston's defense, which features two members on the conference's all-defensive team and Big 12 defensive player of the year, Joseph Tugler, made every rotation and played up in the faces of BYU's ball handlers.
BYU guard Egor Demin had four turnovers in the first half. In the game BYU had 13 turnovers and only 12 assists.
"The thing that they do really well is multiple efforts," BYU head coach Kevin Young said. "You think you got them on a swing-swing or something like that and they do a great job at just continuing to play with multiple efforts."
The most eye-opening stat of the first half was that BYU only had four players put points on the board. Richie Saunders (8), Trey Stewart (5), Dawson Baker (5), and Fousseyni Traore (2) scored all of BYU's 20 first half points.
At one point in the second half, BYU was able to cut the Houston lead to 13 and seemed to have all the momentum at the T-Mobile Center, but back-to-back 3-pointers by Houston's Emanuel Sharp stopped any possible chance at a BYU comeback.
"We knew they were going to go on a run, we just had to survive it," Sharp said.
Sharp led Houston with 26 points on 5 of 7 shooting from deep. Cryer chipped in 20 of his own as well.
Keba Keita (14), Baker (11), and Saunders (10) were the leading scorers for BYU. The next scorer highest was Stewart with five.
"Everything comes a little bit harder in the postseason," Young said. "Every pass is more contested ... every block out gets a little more challenging."
When asked what the locker room vibes were following the loss, Baker mentioned that the team was upset, but isn't completely broken.
"We got competitors so of course we're gonna be bummed out by the loss, but we'll just turn it into something good for us," Baker said.
Young and his crew were obviously frustrated with their performance, but are viewing this game as a learning experience for the big dance next week.
BYU will have to wait until Sunday to find out where and who it will play in the NCAA Tournament. Most outlets predict the Cougars will earn a No. 5 seed.