Texas Longhorns guard Rori Harmon (3) leaves the court at halftime during the NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament Sweet 16 game against Kentucky at Dickies Arena on Saturday, March 28, 2026 in Fort Worth, Texas.
Aaron E. Martinez/Austin American-Statesman
FORT WORTH — On Saturday afternoon, Rori Harmon and Texas women’s basketball handed Kentucky a season-ending loss.
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Harmon shook off a hand injury to lead Texas to an NCAA Tournament win at Dickies Arena. The 76-54 victory — which featured No. 1-seeded Texas behind on the scoreboard for all of 58 seconds — advances the Longhorns (34-3) into Monday’s Elite Eight against Michigan (28-6). The senior point guard finished with 11 points, seven assists, seven rebounds and six steals.
With 4:41 left in the first quarter, however, Harmon jammed the middle finger on her right hand after tumbling to the ground on a foul by Kentucky’s Asia Boone.
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Did the injury impact her? Before Harmon could answer that question after the game, the all-time leader in assists at Texas was set up by head coach Vic Schaefer’s own assist.
“First of all, she made two jumpshots after (it happened). … it doesn’t seem to be too big a deal,” Schaefer said.
It should be noted that Harmon walked into that news conference with a bag of ice for her hand. The fifth-year senior also was seen grimacing in pain during the game.
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But Schaefer wasn’t wrong. In terms of game time, less than 20 seconds separated Harmon’s injury and her first basket of the game, and she made another jumper a couple of minutes later. After spending some time on the bench between the first and second quarters, she re-entered the game and knocked down her 12th 3-pointer of the season.
“It’s pretty swollen right now, but like coach said, I think in the heat of the moment, you kind of forget about it,” Harmon said. “I missed two free throws, so I’m going to blame it on that.”
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The foul that Harmon was injured on led the game into a media timeout, and Schaefer substituted backup point guard Bryanna Preston into the game later in the quarter. Harmon, though, said there was never a conversation about her sitting out the rest of the game.
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“He cares about me and my well-being, obviously, but I played really well after injuring my hand, so that’s his thing, like, OK, she’s fine,” Harmon said. “I knew he was going to put me back in for sure. It’s just a finger. It did swell up pretty bad, so I just tried to get swelling down. And luckily, it’s just the middle finger, so there’s four other fingers around it.”
For Harmon, all of her points, plus three assists, four rebounds and four steals were post-injury statistics. She was part of a defense that pestered Kentucky into 24 turnovers, eight of which were committed by Division I assists leader Tonie Morgan.
“It’s so fun watching her play,” Texas forward Madison Booker said. “In the next level, I think teams are going to need her. If people pass on her in the ‘W,’ I would be extremely shocked.”
Texas Longhorns guard Rori Harmon (3) guards Kentucky guard Tonie Morgan (5) during the NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament Sweet 16 game at Dickies Arena on Saturday, March 28, 2026 in Fort Worth, Texas.
Aaron E. Martinez/Austin American-Statesman
Kentucky unable to contain Rori Harmon, Madison Booker a second time
Last month in Austin, Harmon was mostly held in check by Kentucky in a 64-53 win for the Longhorns. She had just five points and three assists while Booker matched a career-low with her one made field goal.
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This time around, Harmon bested her season-long scoring average. Booker scored 17 points on 8-of-16 shooting.
“I thought our kids really did a bad job taking away the things that we felt like we had to do to have a chance to beat them,” said Schaefer, whose team got 18 points from sophomore guard Jordan Lee.
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