Quick thoughts from No. 4 Texas’ 73-48 win over Northern Arizona

Nov 22, 2022 - 4:12 AM

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Now in the top five of the AP poll for the first time in the Chris Beard era, the Texas Longhorns took the floor against the Northern Arizona Lumberjacks on Monday as part of the Leon Black Classic.

The Longhorns looked far from their best, but still managed a 25-point dub. Here are some quick thoughts from the win.

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Marcus Carr stays hot. After dropped 16 on the Zags last week, the Carr added a season-high 17 to lead the Longhorns on Monday. His shot continues to look consistent and he’s seemingly playing with a ton of comfort and confidence in his new role off the ball. With this version of Marcus Carr, Texas backcourt is going to be an absolute handful.

Arterio Morris flashed a bit. The true freshman was the Horns’ second leading scorer with 11 points behind a pair of three pointers and an and-one poster dunk(?). Per usual, he’s aggressive offensively, but he played a bit more within his role against NAU and was effective. As the season grinds on, he’s a kid Texas will need more and more from.

The offense had a bit of a hangover. It’s hard to nitpick too much after a 25-point win, but the reality is Texas should have won by a hell of a lot more. They followed a 50-point first half with just 23 in the second behind a lengthy drought of sorts as they simply struggled to buy buckets and the offense itself was just a bit out of sync. There’s not typically much you can take from games like this, but I’m sure Chris Beard won’t like what his offense put on film in the second half.

Timmy Allen is having a bit of a rough start to his senior season. He turned the ball over six times tonight to bring his season total to 14 in just four games, and he just hasn’t seemed to find a rhythm offensively — he’s now just 10-26 on the year for 25 points. It just seems like he hasn’t found comfort in his role with this new-look Longhorns group, but Texas will need him to in hopes of being at their best this year.

Northern Arizona has some shot makers. This was my first time ever watching that group, but there were quite a few times when they’d cash in on jumpers that made me think “damn,” or at least “okay!” 48 points isn’t a great offensive performance, but they only reached that figure because they hit some fairly difficult shots fairly consistently.