The Texas Tech basketball team lost 85-78 to TCU on Tuesday night in Fort Worth. Let's take a look at the box score to see why the Red Raiders lost their second Big 12 game of the season.
If you look at Texas Tech's total sales, there are only 13 perks. This is not a surprising number. However, sloppy ball handling was a major reason for the Red Raiders' loss.
It's no fun to single out one man, but Joe Toussaint deserves the biggest share of the blame here. He had a season-high eight turnovers, two more turnovers than points. I should also point out here that he had nine assists, but he still doesn't want to give up the ball eight times in one game.
His departure from the tech company was also premature. Every time the Red Raiders had a chance to put pressure on TCU, a turnover seemed to swing the momentum back in the home team's favor.
What's interesting is that both teams had a 13 point difference in points due to turnovers. However, this giveaway didn't give Tech enough shots to keep pace with the high-powered Frogs.
On this night, TCU had seven more offensive rebounds and four fewer turnovers, resulting in six more shot attempts than Tech. That's important in a game decided by seven points.
The Red Raider defense also couldn't force enough turnovers to keep TCU out of its offensive rhythm. In their last home loss, a one-point loss to Iowa State, they gave up the ball 27 times. Furthermore, in the game against Cincy, they lost by four points, but they scored 19 points.
Tech teams average more than 12 turnovers per game, but they couldn't reach that number Tuesday night. That, combined with Toussaint's rough night, spelled doom for the Red Raiders.
