A win would have bolstered their NCAA tournament chances, but the Horned Frogs were unable to overcome their worst offensive performance of the season against Texas Tuesday.
TCU missed 8 of its first 10 shots and wouldn’t establish a consistent offensive rhythm for the rest of the game, finishing with a season-low 31.1 percent field goal percentage and falling against the No. 21 Longhorns 62-48.
“We shot as bad as we’ve shot in a long time,” head coach Raegan Pebley said. “From the three point line, from the field, from the free throw. We shot really, really poorly.”
The Horned Frogs finished the first quarter leading 15-14 as the Longhorns suffered from an equally slow start.
The two teams would continue their back and forth into the second quarter, entering halftime tied at 31.
However, the second half would prove to be the difference, as TCU finished with just 17 total points on a 5-25 shooting clip. They made one field goal in the final period as the Longhorns pulled ahead to finish the season sweep.
“I think we just have to get back to work,” senior Amy Okonkwo said. “We have a lot to work on, and I think we have put ourselves in a place where we can still get better and that there is more to come.”
The game marked the last home contest for seniors Okonkwo, Jordan Moore and Dakota Vann.
Fittingly, Okonkwo and Moore finished as the Horned Frogs top two scorers, combining for 29 of the teams 48 points.
Moore currently has the eighth-most points in program history with 1,444 and Okonkwo the 12th-most with 1,201. However, neither are content with their TCU careers being over quite yet.
“This is not the end of us, this is just the beginning,” Okonkwo said.” We’ve got a lot more of our story to write so we just have to take it and run with it.”
The team will head to the Big 12 tournament in Oklahoma City sitting at sixth in the conference and firmly on the bubble for the NCAA tournament.
The Horned Frogs finished their regular season conference slate at 10-8, with six of those losses coming to teams ranked in the top 35 of the NCAA’s RPI ranking. Since 1999, a Big 12 team with at least 10 conference wins has always been invited to the NCAA tournament.
“We’re a team that’s very, very worthy,” Pebley said. “ I think we’ve put together a good resume and I think we’ve also had a very tough schedule in these last 10 games and have done some great things with that, especially with having to go win on the road.”
The team will begin their postseason slate at 8:30 p.m. Saturday when they re-match against the Longhorns in the first round of the Big 12 tournament.
“The NCAA tournament will take care of itself,” Pebley said. “We’re going to Oklahoma City with another mission in mind.”
