TCU hoops doesn’t get much love after beating SMU, USC
The TCU men’s basketball team impressed last week.
The Frogs won their first true road game at SMU on Wednesday night in Dallas, and then whipped USC a couple miles from its campus at the Staples Center in Los Angeles on Friday.
The reward? Four more points in the latest Associated Press’ Top 25 poll.
TCU is among a handful of teams receiving votes, earning 13 points from voters. The Frogs had nine points in last week’s poll.
TCU started the season as the No. 20 team in the country and reached as high as No. 18 after a 3-0 start. An early-season loss to Lipscomb, though, knocked TCU out of the poll released Nov. 26. The Frogs have been battling to get their way back in it since.
The wins over SMU and USC were significant for TCU. The Frogs showed life offensively and defensively, and Alex Robinson and Jaylen Fisher have the makings to become one of the better backcourts in the country.
USC coach Andy Enfield mentioned how his team needs to have guard play on the level of Robinson and Fisher.
“We have to have more consistency in our point guard play,” Enfield said after TCU handed him the most lopsided loss, 96-61, in his USC tenure.
“You look at their point guards, they had 12 assists and two turnovers.”
As the Los Angeles Times put it, “[Robinson and Fisher] were the difference between the Horned Frogs performing like a group heading toward back-to-back NCAA tournament berths and the Trojans performing like a squad heading toward a second straight season watching the sport’s signature event from home.”
But, as far as voters are concerned, TCU’s wins last week should have been expected. SMU and USC are two teams with NET rankings over 100, and not many ranked teams faltered. Only three unranked programs from the previous week cracked the Top 25.
Marquette went to No. 21 after knocking off No. 12 Wisconsin; Houston is No. 24 after an 8-0 start that features wins over Oregon and Oklahoma State; and Syracuse is tied at No. 25 after beating Georgetown on Saturday.
Even though TCU didn’t get much love, the Big 12 has the top-ranked team in the country, Kansas. Texas Tech is No. 11 and Kansas State is tied in the 25th spot along with Syracuse and Indiana.
This story was originally published December 10, 2018 at 12:04 PM.