TCU basketball survives South Alabama in first game without Frankie Collins
TCU got back in the win column with a 58-49 victory over South Alabama Monday night, but it did little to change the cloudy outlook of the Horned Frogs’ season right now.
The Horned Frogs lost point guard Frankie Collins for the remainder of the season after he broke his foot against Vanderbilt on Dec. 8. Collins led TCU in points, steals and assists while also being the team’s best defender.
His absence was noticeable against the Jaguars.
To make matters worse, TCU also had to play without forward Brendan Wenzel, who missed the game with an ankle sprain that could keep him out a few games.
“I liked how we did it, it wasn’t pretty obviously,” coach Jamie Dixon said. “We had a point guard (Noah Reynolds) playing out there whose hand is still bothering him. But we needed somebody to play point guard and I applaud him for playing through it.”
Without their floor general and best shooter, the Horned Frogs got off to a rocky start and found themselves in a close battle with a South Alabama team that has lost to Western Illinois and Central Michigan.
Two of TCU’s first three possessions resulted in turnovers as it was indecisive early against South Alabama’s zone defense. Collins would’ve been the one penetrating and creating looks for others, but without his slashing ability TCU was limited to just passing the ball around the arc with multiple scoring droughts throughout the game.
With just over five minutes remaining in the first half, TCU trailed 23-21 as the Jaguars’ zone defense controlled the pace of the game.
The second half saw TCU’s offense continue to struggle as the strategy of passively passing the ball around the arc was TCU’s preferred method of trying to break down the zone defense.
To the Horned Frogs’ credit, the defense was on point even without Collins guarding the best player on the opposing team. South Alabama shot below 40% and could never truly take advantage of TCU’s shortcomings.
“At the end of the day we got it done defensively,” Dixon said. “We defended and rebounded, you want to be able to do that when you have everything else going on. I didn’t know Jace (Posey) was going to play, I didn’t know Tra (White) was going to play until game time. Our best shooter is out, we’ve had a unique season so far.
“We just had to adapt, I had a number of guys that weren’t playing 100% and I just like how we did it.”
The key stretch of the game came midway through the second half when TCU held South Alabama scoreless for over five minutes. During that stretch TCU turned a 42-41 deficit into a 48-42 lead after a 7-0 run sparked by Jace Posey and Vasean Allette, who started in place of Collins.
The defining stretch offered a glimpse how TCU will have to operate once Big 12 play starts on Jan. 4 against Kansas State.
The Horned Frogs weren’t offensive juggernauts with Collins as their 73.2 points per game ranked just 242nd nationally, but the offense with Collins was much better than what the Horned Frogs showed Monday night.
Until this new group led by Allette, Reynolds, White and Ernest Udeh builds more chemistry on offense in the half court, it’s imperative that the defensive effort remains intense going forward.
“Defensively we can always improve,” White said. “I think we gave up too many layups tonight. We just gotta work on meeting our goals on the defensive end. Offensively I think everything is going to start falling, we have a lot of scorers on this team.”
White or Allette appear to be in line to take over as the leading scorers.
White started the game hot with eight points and two 3s in the first half. After missing his first five shots in the second half, White made two key plays with less than five minutes remaining. He converted a three-point play to give TCU a 51-44 lead with 4:03 remaining.
Then when South Alabama cut it to 51-47, White stole an errant pass by a Jaguar guard and converted the layup to put TCU back up 53-47. White is more of a forward, but played shooting guard at different points during the game.
Allette led TCU with 14 points with most of them coming in the final 10 minutes, but will he be able to maintain that aggressiveness while also having a bigger responsibility of creating shots for others?
Reynolds is another that must step up as the lead guard. Reynolds was held scoreless until he hit a pair of free throws with 1:41 remaining to put TCU ahead 55-47. Reynolds’ nagging hand injury will be another storyline to watch, especially if Wenzel misses Big 12 games.
Overall it was a far from pretty display of basketball, but the Horned Frogs found a way to win short-handed. Until the Horned Frogs get healthier, this just might be how they have to win games going forward.
This story was originally published December 16, 2024 at 9:54 PM.
