{"id":225603,"date":"2026-03-29T09:00:13","date_gmt":"2026-03-29T09:00:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/225603\/"},"modified":"2026-03-29T09:00:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-29T09:00:13","slug":"texas-has-cruised-to-the-elite-eight-now-its-time-for-the-hard-part","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/225603\/","title":{"rendered":"Texas Has Cruised to the Elite Eight. Now It\u2019s Time for the Hard Part.\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"

FORT WORTH \u2014 Vic Schaefer says he was not bothered by how his Texas team played in the second half of its 76\u201354 win over Kentucky in the Sweet 16. Give him credit for honesty, and also credit for watching the second half. That\u2019s dedication, folks.<\/p>\n

Kentucky took an early 3\u20130 lead and should have immediately called timeout to snap a picture of the scoreboard. Texas scored the next 15 points. The Longhorns led by 20 early in the second quarter and 22 at the break.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Schaefer is an old-school coach who began the game wearing a sportcoat and holding a rolled-up sheet of paper, as though he was simultaneously coaching his team and auditioning for \u201cBoring As Hell: The Hank Iba Story.\u201d Sometimes, Schaefer indulges himself by taking a break from watching film so he can watch more film. He wants his players to play every possession like the score is 0\u20130, and would you like to guess the problem with that?<\/p>\n

\u201cIn their minds,\u201d Schaefer said, \u201cthey\u2019re like, \u2018Coach, it\u2019s not 0\u20130. We\u2019re up 20.\u2019 \u201d<\/p>\n

Their minds are apparently connected to their eyes, which they use to look at the scoreboard. Even in the SEC tournament title game, Texas led South Carolina<\/a> 45\u201328 at the half.<\/p>\n

This Kentucky game was never in doubt\u2014even when the Wildcats had that 3\u20130 lead. The Longhorns are so good that Kentucky and probably 58 other teams in this tournament would have to play out of their minds to beat them.<\/p>\n

At halftime, the Wildcats had played six quarters of basketball against Texas this season and held Longhorns star Madison Booker to 16 points, total. Yet the Longhorns had outscored Kentucky by 33.<\/p>\n

A year ago, you could fairly say that as Booker went, so went the Longhorns. South Carolina held Booker to 11 points in the Final Four and rolled Texas. But Texas is a better offensive team now. They can even beat you with threes, though it\u2019s not their preference. Schaefer says \u201cif it\u2019s not my best offensive team, it\u2019s my second best offensive team that I\u2019ve ever had.\u201d (His 2018\u201319 Mississippi State team finished second in the country in scoring.)<\/p>\n

\u201cUsually every team has one good defender,\u201d Schaefer said. \u201cSome have two. Not very many have three. It just makes it a tough match-up for people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Texas is 34\u20133. Getting to 37\u20133 would deliver Schaefer his first national title, but those last three wins will be tough to get. All those tournament teams that can\u2019t beat Texas are gone now.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Michigan can beat Texas on Monday<\/a>. South Carolina did it in November. UConn probably has a better team<\/a> than Texas, and UCLA certainly has a better roster, though perhaps not a better team.<\/p>\n

\"Vic<\/p>\n

Schaefer admits that he coaches his team hard, no matter how big of a lead the Longhorns have. | Chris Jones-Imagn Images<\/p>\n

So yeah: Winning three more will be hard. But beating Texas is also hard. Scoring against Texas is hard. The Longhorns start by putting you in a headlock and then get serious.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe definitely put a premium on starting fast, getting out, and punching first in the first five minutes,\u201d Texas guard Jordan Lee said. \u201cDefinitely proud of us for that start.\u201d<\/p>\n

Booker insisted afterward that \u201cwinning is never easy.\u201d She is right. For Texas, winning is expected, and it\u2019s predictable, but that doesn\u2019t mean it is easy. Like probably every team Schaefer has ever coached, the Longhorns take pride in the work and even the pain. Guard Rori Harmon jammed her middle finger on her right hand and said it was swollen afterward, but it didn\u2019t seem to affect her.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just love how we opened the game,\u201d Schaefer said. \u201cI love how we came out ready to go. I love how we defended the first half. I just thought we were really, really locked in. Our transition was obviously very good early, and that was off of our defense \u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cYou know, you can usually tell with our group: If we\u2019re locked in and focused, we\u2019re usually creating some problems defensively for people.\u201d<\/p>\n

For the Longhorns, the second-half cruise-control phase of the tournament is probably over. It\u2019s heavy-hitter time. They can\u2019t wait.<\/p>\n

More March Madness from Sports Illustrated<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FORT WORTH \u2014 Vic Schaefer says he was not bothered by how his Texas team played in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":225604,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[27,29,28],"class_list":["post-225603","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225603","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=225603"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225603\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/225604"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=225603"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=225603"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=225603"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}