Longhorns prove too much for Owls
For much of this season, supporters of men's basketball have been able to add another to the list of certainties in life. Besides death and taxes, there was the performance of shooting guard Tom McGhee.
Establishing himself as one of the top outside shooters in the nation, McGhee had been consistently strong. He had surpassed the 20 point-mark in 14 of the Owls' first 19 games. Every once in a while, McGhee had proven capable of the spectacular -- his 35 points led the way for a Rice upset victory over the University of Texas in January.
The Longhorns, however, were able to shut down McGhee in the return match Wednesday night at Autry Court.
Forcing him to misfire on 14 of 16 shots, Texas held McGhee to 11 points and pulled away in the late going for a 79-64 victory.
Rice, who had dropped a 22-point decision to 13th-ranked Texas Tech University Saturday at Autry Court, fell to 11-9 overall, 3-5 in the Southwest Conference. Texas improved to 13-6, 6-2.
The final regular season SWC contest between the Owls and Longhorns was a physical one.
Rice and Texas combined for 70 trips to the foul line, 44 of those by the Longhorns.
Even with that many whistles, though, the Owls claimed afterward that perhaps the officials turned a blind eye to much of the contact on the court.
This, they felt, could have been responsible for poor shooting figures from McGhee and his teammates, who converted only 36.5 percent of their shots from the floor.
"All I can do is go out and play," McGhee said. "If the officials don't call it, I just have to play through it. I just couldn't get any shots to fall."
Wilson said, "Tommy took 16 shots and only made two, and only went to the free throw line six times. There were a lot of hands laid on him.
"Shaun Igo shoots the ball 15 times, most in the paint, and he only got to shoot two free throws. It was a physical game, and the calls just didn't go our way," he said.
Because of foul trouble, Rice was unable to keep its starting unit together for long periods of time.
Igo, honored as SWC Player of the Week for the previous week, picked up two quick fouls in the first half and wound up playing only six minutes out of the first 20. Despite the limited playing time, he managed to lead Rice with 18 points and 10 rebounds.
J.J. Polk fouled out after playing only 24 minutes. T.J. Armstrong came off the bench and provided some of his strongest play of the season with seven points and nine rebounds in 19 minutes, but he also picked up five fouls, often trying to guard much players who were much bigger.
"I'm disappointed we weren't able to keep our best guys on the court because of foul trouble," Wilson said. "If we're able to hit some shots and keep our best guys on the court, it's a different game."
Still, the Owls hung around after the Longhorns took the lead to stay, at 23-21, with 9:20 to play in the first half.
From that point on, the game followed a simple pattern: Texas would drift ahead by a few points, Rice would look as though they were going to charge back into the game, the Longhorns would make a big play and pull away again.
Case in point: With 8:09 to go in the game, Texas' Reggie Freeman hit three free throws for a 61-51 Longhorn advantage.
Rice responded with a Polk basket and two Nanney free throws to cut the margin to six, and the Owls looked as though they would gain possession after a Texas miss.
Sonny Alverado grabbed the offensive rebound after it bounced off of two Owls, and slowed the rally with his ensuing lay-up.
Texas padded the lead at the end by hitting 11 of 12 free throws over the final 1:58.
"The score didn't say what the game was really like," said Rice forward Robert Johnson, who finished with 15 points. "We got desperate at the end and started jacking up some threes and making some bad decisions."
Wilson said, "We played really hard with a lot of intensity for about 38 minutes. The last two to two and a half minutes, we let up when the game was not over."
Kris Clack led Texas with 25 points and 10 rebounds. Alverado and Lamont Hill contributed 16 points apiece.
Rice travels across town to Hofheinz Pavilion to take on the University of Houston tomorrow at 7:30 p.m.
The Owls find themselves firmly in the middle of the SWC pack, but with enough conference games remaining, and enough glimmers of potential, that they could still finish with a decent record.
"We're gonna try to stay motivated," McGhee said. "We're going to go to practice tomorrow and try to start there."
This item appeared in the Sports section of the February 9, 1996 issue.
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