LUBBOCK – Down nine with a little over eight minutes to play, No. 15 Texas Tech stormed back to earn an 84-71 win over No. 11 BYU on Saturday at a sold-out United Supermarkets Arena. JT Toppin recorded his seventh straight double-double and led Tech with 27 points and 12 rebounds while Christian Anderson had 22 points and seven assists and LeJuan Watts went for 20 points and eight rebounds. The Red Raiders (14-4, 4-1 Big 12) improved to 10-0 at home and snapped a 13-game winning streak by the Cougars (16-2, 4-1 Big 12) after outscoring their opponent 32-10 over the final eight minutes – a closing run that started with a Watts 3-pointer to stop an 8-0 run by BYU and finished with Tech making its final seven shots.

“Obviously a super talented BYU team who had us on the ropes,” Texas Tech coach Grant McCasland said. “The energy in the United Supermarkets Arena is just hard to describe to people until you experience it. The will to win in the building and LeJuan gave us a lift with his 3. Our guys believed we were going to win the game but we had to do it in a very defensive way. The last 10 minutes we probably played the best defense we’ve played this year. For as many minutes as our guys played, the grit shows a ton about the compete level of JT Toppin, Christian Anderson and how it’s just oozing throughout the rest of the guys. We are believing we can win no matter what it takes.”

The Red Raiders went into halftime with a 32-31 lead but would see the Cougars dominate a stretch midway through the second half to go up nine. After Robert Wright hit a 3-pointer and jumper and Richie Saunders buried another 3-pointer, BYU had a 61-52 lead with 9:26 remaining in the game. Watts would stop the run, hitting a 3-pointer off an assist from Anderson with 8:09 remaining before three free throws by Jaylen Petty made it a three-point game and an and-one by Toppin tied the game at 63-all with six minutes on the clock. Toppin gave Tech the lead back when he banked in a 3-pointer for a 66-65 lead with 5:29 remaining and was followed by back-to-back 3-pointers from Watts and Anderson to put the Red Raiders up seven. Two free throws from Anderson gave Tech an 11-0 run and a 74-65 lead. Down nine, just minutes before, Tech had a double-digit lead for the first time on a Watts layup and was up 15 in the final minute when Anderson buried a pair free throws to put it away.

“Every time we went into the huddle during a timeout we just kept telling ourselves that we were still going to win this game,” Toppin said. “We were making mistakes that was getting us down. We just told ourselves to stay together. We’ve been in tough situations like that in the non-con and are kind of used to it. We stayed together and the outcome was great.”

Tech finished the game shooting 11-for-29 on 3-pointers while BYU was limited to just 5-for-22 from beyond the arc. Anderson led the Red Raiders by making 4-of-10 and Toppin was 3-for-4 to match his career high for 3-point makes in back-to-back games. Watts made 2-for-4 and Donovan Atwell and Petty made one each. Petty finished the game with 10 points, four assists and four rebounds while Atwell had five points and two steals. Along with a strong advantage on 3s, Tech also pulled away at the free-throw line where it went 19-for-23 and BYU was 12-of-14. Toppin, who started his streak of seven straight double-doubles in the win over Duke, is now averaging 21.6 points and 11.2 rebounds per game. He also added two steals and a block against BYU. Anderson is now scoring 19.8 points per game and leads the Big 12 with 7.4 assists per game.

Wright led the Cougars with 28 points after going 9-for-9 at the free-throw line freshman AJ Dybantsa was held to a season-low 13 points on 6-for-17 shooting from the field and 0-for-3 on 3-pointers. Dybantsa came into the game leading the Big 12 with 23.1 points per game. Saunders finished with 18 points after going 3-for-7 on 3-pointers in a game where BYU shot only 22.2% from beyond the arc. The Cougars, who had started conference play with four straight wins, committed 12 turnovers and saw the Red Raiders own a 16-9 scoring advantage on points off turnovers.  

Tech took a 32-31 lead into halftime with Toppin hitting a 3-pointer with 45 seconds remaining for the final points of the half. The 3-pointer was the fifth of the first half for the Red Raiders while BYU was only 1-for-8 from deep. Toppin led Tech with 10 points and eight rebounds at the break while Anderson had eight points and two assists while Watts had six points and four rebounds. Anderson had two 3-pointers, including the first and second for the Red Raiders who jumped out to an 8-2 lead after his makes. BYU would take its first lead of the game after a 6-0 run put it up 15-13 before a layup by Toppin brought it back to even. The score was tied again at 29-29 when Groves came up with an offensive rebound and kicked it out a pass to Atwell who buried a 3-pointer. The first half saw four lead changes and seven ties.  

Texas Tech and BYU will meet again in the regular season finale on March 7 at the Marriott Center in Provo, Utah. The Red Raiders return to action next week with a road game against Baylor at 8 p.m. on Tuesday at the Foster Pavillion in Waco before returning home to host Houston on Saturday at the USA. During the win over BYU, it was announced that ESPN’s College GameDay Covered by State Farm will take place in Lubbock on Saturday before the game against Houston. The show is making its first on-campus production of the season and will air from 10-11 a.m. at the USA. Fans are encouraged to attend with doors opening at 9 a.m. – an hour before the show which is hosted by Rece Davis who is joined by Jay Bilas, Andraya Carter, Seth Greenberg and Jay Williams.

Follow the Red Raiders: Keep up with Texas Tech men’s basketball news at TexasTech.com and at the team’s social media on Instagram, X and Facebook.