On Tuesday afternoon in Kansas City, Missouri, two Big 12 teams clashed in an exciting back-and-forth matchup
Jamie Dixon and the TCU Horned Frogs faced off against Tad Boyle and the Colorado Buffaloes for the second time in the last four days in the second match of the Big 12 Tournament. The game favored Colorado for the bulk of the game, but TCU made it competitive with a second-half storm. In the end, Boyle’s group prevailed and will advance to tangle with West Virginia on Wednesday.
With that, here are the top three takeaways from Colorado’s 69-67 win over the TCU.
Don’t Call it a Comeback
While Colorado earned the win with some timely shots in the second half, the game didn’t come without its fair share of adversity. Colorado led the Horned Frogs by as much as 14 in the second half before Jamie Dixon and company came screaming back to cut the lead to one possession.
In the final five minutes of regulation, TCU cut the Colorado lead from 13 points down to just two points. Still, Colorado found a way to hold off the Horned Frogs’ push with some clutch free throw shooting and advanced to Wednesday’s game.
A Tale of Two Halves
TCU started off the game in awful fashion, going 0-13 from the field before converting their first bucket at the 12:03 mark. A large portion of that came from senior guard Noah Reynolds, who put together a horrendous effort in the first 20 minutes of the game. He left for the halftime break with zero points to his name.
Another player with a minuscule first half was Colorado’s Andrej Jakimovski, who had two more points than Reynolds, with one bucket on the stat sheet. Luckily for the pair, basketball is a 40-minute game.
In the second half, Reynolds and Jakimovski were completely different players who caught fire out of the halftime gates. Jakimovski added 16 second-half points to lead the team, going 7-15 from the field and 4-11 from three. Reynolds followed suit with 17 second-half points after a disastrous start.
Is That It?
With the loss for TCU, the question becomes, will that be the last time we see them this year?
The Horned Frogs were eliminated from any conversation of an at-large bid a few weeks ahead of the Big 12 Tournament, but they are close enough to head to either the NIT or CBC.
While nothing is set in stone, based on recent some recent reports about the College Basketball Crown Tournament in Las Vegas, two Big 12 teams are expected to earn invites to the tournament.
Will TCU want to play in either? That question remains to be seen.
