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Abilene Christian destroyed Texas.
The No.14 Wildcats forced 23 turnovers from Texas in a 53-52 win to knock the Longhorns out of the NCAA tournament in the first round for the fourth consecutive time.
Andrew Jones of the Longhorns went three with 14.7 seconds left to put Texas ahead of 52-51. But Abilene Christian’s Joe Pleasant suffered an offensive rebound attempt 1.2 seconds from the end by Texas’s Matt Coleman. Pleasant – a 58.5 percent free throw shooter – hit both of his free throws for the win.
The ACU victory means three teams ranked No 13 or worse – ACU, Ohio, North Texas and Oral Roberts – have won the first round games of the 2021 NCAA tournament. The Wildcats will advance to play 11th UCLA in second. Monday tour in the eastern region.
If Abilene Christian turns Texas upside down, it would be the first time that four teams ranked 13th or lower have each won a round of 16 game.
– Chris Fallica (@chrisfallica) March 21, 2021
It’s the first NCAA tournament victory in school history for Abilene Christian. The school’s only other NCAA tournament appearance came in 2019, when she was a 15 seed and lost in the first round.
Texas haven’t won a tournament game since 2014
The Longhorns are now on a five-tournament winless streak despite entering the tournament after winning the Big 12 tournament. Texas have been eliminated in the first round in four consecutive tournament appearances since winning the first round in 2014.
Two of those losses were heartbreaking. Jones’ shot appeared to propel the Longhorns into the second round on Saturday night. And Texas lost in the first round in 2016 when Paul Jesperson conceded a half-court shot for northern Iowa to upset the Longhorns.
Texas’ last victory in the NCAA tournament came in 2014 when the Longhorns defeated Arizona State 87-85. Rick Barnes was the team’s coach at the time. Current coach Shaka Smart hasn’t won an NCAA tournament game since his time in Austin. Is it satisfying for a school that has shown this fall with its football team that it is ready to make a major change of coach when good is not good enough?
Abilene Christian is one of five of 32 teams in the second round of the Texas State NCAA Tournament. And his players immediately knew how to wave the hand “horns” once the match was over.
It was a nasty victory for Abilene Christian
Abilene Christian entered the game, forcing more than 20 turnovers per game. And they really needed all those Texas turnovers they forced on Saturday night to get the win. The score of the box is hideous.
The Wildcats were only 20 of 67 off the field and 3 of 18 porous against three on Saturday night. An underdog usually scores a dissatisfaction with shots at three hot spots. But no ACU player has hit more than a three and Pleasant and Coryon Mason were the only two ACU players in double digits.
Texas was 18 of 40 on the field and shot 35% of three. But the Longhorns took 27 fewer shots than the ACU and those two extra Wildcats marks from all those Texas turnovers turned out to be the difference.
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