Men's Basketball postcard: Houston, Texas (Dec. 19)
Dec. 19, 2008
Hello Longhorn fans, Greetings and Happy Holidays from Houston, Texas as we prepare for the Michigan State Spartans. This is a special game for me, playing in my hometown for the last time as a Texas Longhorn. We’ve played in Houston a few times since I’ve been a Longhorn and there have been lots of good memories. This will be my sixth collegiate game played here and the fourth at the Toyota Center. As a freshman we played Rice. It wasn’t my best game ever. I had a lot of fouls and a few missed shots in not much time, but I do think I snagged two or three steals and we won, which is all that counts. My sophomore season we had the epic overtime battle against LSU who was ranked in the Top 10 at the time. It was coming off a game against Gonzaga in which we didn’t play well and we needed a good effort. We ended up beating the Tigers in what was sort of a “coming out” party for D.J. Augustin. I remember the game was special to him because he was playing an LSU team that he had some thoughts of joining before he finally decided to come to Texas. Last year, we played Rice again at the Toyota Center. I think I played a little better in that game than the first time around. And of course last year, we also capped our season off with a pair of games at Reliant Stadium in the NCAA Regionals. That provided a real high when we beat a Stanford team that many thought would gave us trouble and we beat them pretty soundly. There was a lot of talk about how Stanford would win because they had a better inside game, but Dexter (Pittman), Chap (Clint Chapman), Gary (Johnson) and Damion (James) played some really solid minutes inside and Justin (Mason) as always played a lot bigger than his size and we won by 20. The season ended with the loss against Memphis. It was a tough game and it left us with a bitter taste in our mouth. We fell behind early and found ourselves trying to play catch-up the whole game, which is tough to do against Memphis. And it didn’t help that it was one of the rare games on the season in which the Tigers made free throws (30-of-36).
I’m happy that Coach Barnes continues to schedule games in Houston. Not only does it help in recruiting players from the area, but it also serves as a ‘Thank You’ to the players on the team from the area. It allows us play in front of more of our friends and family than we are normally able to play in front of in Austin. We expect a tough game tomorrow from Michigan State. They are a physical team with lots of talent and they are going to give us challenge, much like we’ve already gotten from Notre Dame and UCLA and Villanova. The game is on CBS with regional coverage. So hopefully, if you can’t make it out to the Toyota Center, you live in a region that will have the game. Hook’ em |
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