Hoosiers' offense struggles against Longhorns in NIT consolation game

NEW YORK -- In IU's loss to Temple, the Hoosiers lacked toughness, interim head coach Mike Davis said. In the consolation game of the National Invitational Tournament, IU lacked toughness and a shooting touch.\nIU made only six shots in the first half as Texas raced out to an early 10-point lead that paved the way for a 70-58 Longhorn victory Friday.\n"They played tougher than we did," Davis said. "Our guys have been coming out and feeling their way. We're not giving the effort it takes to win."\nTexas, like Temple, used a variety of zones and traps to confuse IU's offense. Davis said the lack of a true point guard hurt the Hoosiers offensively.\n"People have high expectations for us, but, really, they're unrealistic because we don't have a true point guard," Davis said. "We have an offense and guys not running it because they afraid somebody will take the ball from them. It's really tough trying to hide that. You can't hide it because you can't hide it once people pressure you and trap you."\nDavis described how the offense he designed should have worked against the zone. \n"We didn't do that but twice in the first half," Davis said.\nIn the first 13 minutes of play, IU scored only 12 points and was down by as many as 21 late in the half.\n"We were executing and came out with more intensity than they had," Longhorn junior forward Chris Owens said. "We forced them into bad shots and got the rebounds and kicked it out."\nThe Hoosiers came out of the locker room after halftime and cut Texas' 20-point lead down to nine with 11:08 remaining. During that stretch, the Hoosiers forced six turnovers and junior center Kirk Haston scored seven points.\n"We got tentative coming out after halftime," Texas coach Rick Barnes said. "We were on our heels and forcing shots. We were not in sync and just bogged down."\nDavis said to his team at halftime that he wanted the lead cut to 10 before 10 minutes remained. He half-joked that he should have told them that he wanted the lead cut to zero by the time the final buzzer sounded.\nOwens said he was happy with the way Texas responded to IU's charge and held off the upstart Hoosiers.\n"We handled their run pretty well," Owens said. "I'm pleased with the way we stuck together as a team."\nTexas pushed the lead to 19 on two occasions late in the game.\nHaston finished with 22 points and 12 rebounds. Freshman forward Jared Jeffries scored 13 points.