AUSTIN (KXAN) — About three weeks from the Big 12 Conference tournament, the Texas Longhorns need to grab a couple more wins in the regular season or else they may be watching the NCAA tournament from the couch.
Heading into Monday night’s game against Kansas State, the Longhorns are in a precarious spot. At 5-7, Texas and K-State are tied for ninth place in the conference. This is incredibly important in the conference tournament because if they end up in 11th place or lower, they’ll have to play a first-round game. That means if they want to make a run at a tournament championship, they’d have to play five consecutive games. That’s certa inly not an ideal situation.
In addition, a home loss to Kansas State would put a big bruise on the Longhorns’ resumé. It would go down as a Quad 3 loss in their NET rankings and would be the second such loss of the season. The NET, or NCAA Evaluation Tool, rankings are the main component the NCAA tournament selection committee uses for picking and seeding teams in the tournament. Losses to teams in Quad 3 and 4 are considered to be “bad losses,” and the committee typically dings teams pretty hard when those losses add up.
Texas’ current NET ranking is No. 31, so not terrible but not particularly great. Kansas State is No. 81, so the Longhorns need to secure a home win tonight or else they’ll sink further in the rankings.
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ESPN’s Joe Lunardi has faith in the Longhorns and is still projecting them to make the NCAA tournament. The bracket prediction specialist projects Texas as a No. 8 seed but has moved the Longhorns from the West Region to the Midwest Region. And of course, he has them in the same bracket as top overall seed Purdue and a first-round matchup with old foe Texas A&M.
Wins are at a premium this time of year, and with the remaining schedule for the Longhorns, they could be tough to come by. The team has to go to Allen Fieldhouse on Saturday to take on Kansas, travel to Lubbock on Feb. 27 to play Texas Tech and Waco on March 4 to play Baylor. They have Oklahoma State and Oklahoma at home, but those teams are also lower in the NET rankings than Texas.