Texas basketball is instant offense. Sadly, that applies to both ends.
To win in tough road environments, it has to be about more than shot-making. Texas has made enough of those to win more games, but the current lack of accountability on defense will kill any sliver of NCAA Tournament hope if this trend continues. The Horns made plenty of jump shots Wednesday night in the first half at Auburn’s Neville Arena aka, “The Jungle,” but they couldn’t overcome their biggest issue.
Article continues below this ad
Texas Longhorns head coach Sean Miller gestures to his team during the first half of Lone Star Showdown, Jan. 17, 2026 at the Moody Center in Austin. Texas A&M won the game 74-70.
Sara Diggins/Austin American-Statesman
MORE CED:Texas football disappointed but landed in the Ceddys
TEXAS AT OKLAHOMA
When/where: 1 p.m. Saturday in Norman, Okla.
TV/radio: ESPN2; 1300 AM, 98.1 FM.
We’ll remember the 88-82 loss as the night Texas couldn’t miss in the first half while helplessly watching as Auburn guards Keyshawn Hall and Kevin Overton smashed this defense in debilitating fashion.
Article continues below this ad
There is no defending this defense because this defense doesn’t defend. While the Horns are seventh nationally in offensive rating according to KenPom.com, the defense is a horrid 111th. That’s the second-worst figure among SEC teams and ahead of only Oklahoma, Saturday’s opponent which has lost seven in a row.
MORE HORNS: How Texas athletics lost money in 2025
It’s a killer that Texas took care of the ball in the second half yet still couldn’t hold an eight-point lead. This is a defensive problem. Texas has numerous issues on that end and it’s wasting a pretty good offensive year to the consternation of first-year coach Sean Miller.
Article continues below this ad
“I would just say this to you guys right here,” Miller told reporters. “I’m a visiting coach. I’m here at Auburn, in a big road game in late January. My team went 26-for-50 from the field, 12-for-26 from (3-point range) and 18 of 23 from the foul line. We had 11 turnovers, but we only had two in the second half, and we scored 82 points. We lost.”
MORE CED:Portal, NIL were needed, but college football lost its way
Miller is dying on his debut vine. He has a team that’s talented enough to hang in there against quality competition, but the Horns are a sieve, bound to trip over their own shoelaces at money time. In today’s game, 82 points should be good enough to win a college basketball game but at Texas, the only guarantee is a shootout.
You are what record says you are and the Horns are 12-9 overall and 3-5 in conference play with 10 games left in the regular season.
Article continues below this ad
Texas Longhorns forward Dailyn Swain (3) puts his arms up to encourage the crowd as the clock winds down in the second half of the Longhorns’ game against the Georgia Bulldogs at the Moody Center in Austin, Jan. 24, 2026. Texas won the game 87-67.
Sara Diggins/Austin American-Statesman
ESPN’s Joe Lunardi had the Horns as one of his Last Four teams in his early NCAA Tournament projection, but they are back on bubble watch after wasting a promising first half. They’re a dangerous opponent on most nights, but the intangibles are missing such as simple basketball logic on defense that should kick in during close games like the one they just played. Or closing out on defense without fouling, blocking out on the boards, helping out on the weak side, etc.
Sign up for Ced’s Corner
Sign up for Cedric Golden’s newsletter for hot takes and expert analysis each Tuesday on Texas Longhorns football and beyond. It’s called Ced’s Corner, from the mind of the American-Statesman’s resident sports columnist, the 2025 NSMA Texas Sportswriter of the Year.
Article continues below this ad
The fouls are the most troublesome issue. Miller called it a virus after the Horns hacked Kentucky into 35 free throws in a previous road loss. That sickness felt like a plague Wednesday as Auburn shot 39 of them on 26 Texas fouls.
Fouls kill. Turnovers kill. Put them together and you get a basketball corpse. Texas turned it over too much early and couldn’t stop one of the country’s most explosive scorers late.
Visual evidence of the fan base’s frustration came at the end when Texas forward Dailyn Swain, a bona fide All-SEC candidate, threw down a monstrous dunk for his 30th point to to pull the Horns to within 86-82 with 7.9 seconds left, but on a night when Texas fouls were falling from the sky, their best player begged off fouling Hall to stop the clock. Hall, who absolutely killed Texas in the second half with 27 of his 31 points, ended up converting a layup with a couple of ticks left.
Article continues below this ad
Can’t have that. It’s called game awareness — Basketball 101 — and the Horns are lacking in that area.
The fouls came back with a vengeance
Even Miller, one of the smartest basketball minds in the sport, let some of that virus affect him when he stepped onto the court, making contact with an Auburn player who lost the ball. Fortunately, the refs didn’t see the infraction, else Miller would have been whistled for a technical foul.
It would have made sense. His players can’t help but foul. Maybe he wanted to fit in.
Article continues below this ad
Nothing rankles fans more than a team that continues to make the same mistake over and over again. It’s the definition of insanity. As if Longhorn Nation weren’t frustrated enough, the Horns played one of their most explosive first halves of the season by shooting 56.5% from the field, including a sizzling 8 of 14 from the 3-point line, but it’s almost like they’re allergic to prosperity.
In a half where they should have been up by 15 to 20 points with those kinds of numbers, the Horns committed 11 turnovers — three on inbounds plays — and registered just four assists, allowing the Tigers to stick around. Most damning was point guard Jordan Pope fouling Hall on a 3-pointer late in the half as the ball went through the net. Up until that point, Hall, Auburn’s leading scorer at 20.3 points per game, was scoreless.
Texas led 42-34 at the intermission. The Horns landed several big blows, but the knockout shot never connected. They left the Tigers breathing and predictably, as the triples stopped falling, the fouls began to mount. That one near the end of the half woke Hall up. He emerged from the locker room with eight straight points and just like that, the Horns were in a dogfight.
They couldn’t guard, so they fouled. And then they fouled some more. Auburn gladly took 28 foul shots in the last 20 minutes, making 22 of them.
Article continues below this ad
Miller is an old-school coach who will continue to challenge his team to raise its level, though it has to be concerning to know 30 points from Swain wasn’t enough to push them across the finish line in a hostile environment.
You have read in this space that a 9-9 finish in the regular season is what the Horns should aspire to and that would mean going 6-4 down the stretch. They’re talented enough to go on some sort of mini-run, but these players are going to have to show they can play smarter for more than one consecutive game.
That means getting stops at crunch time.
Article continues below this ad