In a battle for first place in the Big 12 Conference, the No. 5 Kansas Jayhawks were victorious, defeating the No. 13 Texas Tech Red Raiders 94-91 in double overtime on Monday.
Kansas’ Ochai Agbaji had a career-high 37 points to outduel Texas Tech’s Bryson Williams, who finished with 33 points. Agbaji scored 24 of his points after halftime and made seven of the eight total three-pointers scored by the Jayhawks on the night.Â
Kansas (17-2, 6-1 Big 12) avenged their lone conference loss earlier this season when Texas Tech (15-5, 5-3) defeated the Jayhawks 75-67 on January 8 in Lubbock. In that game, the Red Raiders were without arguably their two best players, Kevin McCullar and Terrence Shannon Jr., yet still came out victorious. Â
They were in the lineup on Monday night but did not make much of a positive difference for Texas Tech. McCullar and Shannon Jr. combined to make just 2-of-17 shot attempts for seven points. Both appeared uncomfortable and out of rhythm all night, perhaps due to playing in front of a raucous Kansas home crowd.Â
With McCullar and Shannon, Jr., having poor games, Williams essentially carried the Red Raiders offense. At halftime, the Jayhawks held a 36-30 lead, then Williams caught fire, scoring 11 points in the first eight minutes of the second half and bringing the deficit to three points.Â
Kansas answered with an 8-0 run to extend the lead to double-digits for the first time all game. When the Jayhawks took their biggest lead of the night at 70-58, the Red Raiders responded by scoring six straight points to start a 17-5 run to finish regulation.Â
Shannon, Jr., scored two free throws to tie the game at 75 with 13 seconds left, then Agbaji’s last-second three-pointer was off-target to send the game into overtime.Â
Texas Tech held an 85-80 lead in the first overtime with less than two minutes left. Then, Agbaji took over and scored a layup with 1:09 remaining, then a three-pointer with seven seconds left to tie the score at 86. Kansas closed the first overtime on a 6-1 run.
The Red Raiders took a 91-89 lead in the second overtime before a layup from the Jayhawks’ K.J. Adams tied the score at 91 with 1:39 left. Kansas then scored the game’s last three points from the free-throw line. Shannon, Jr., missed a three-pointer in the last few seconds that would have tied the game.Â
A significant difference from the team’s meeting earlier in the season was points in the paint. In the January 8 game, the Jayhawks managed to score only 18 points in the paint the entire game. On Monday night, Kansas had 18 points in the paint by halftime.Â
The Jayhawks now hold a one-game lead over the Baylor Bears for first place in the Big 12 conference. The Red Raiders drop to third place for now, with more Big 12 intra-conference games this week pending.
Texas Tech knows how hard it is to win on the road against Kansas. The Red Raiders are now 1-21 all-time playing at the Jayhawks’ home arena, Allen Fieldhouse.Â