 "Photo: Ruben Castillo")
Texas Tech coach Pat Knight's tirade and subsequent ejection obviously ignited his team's intensity midway through the second half against Nebraska Saturday.
However, while he was pleased with the effort his players showed in trimming an 18-point lead to five points late in the game, he was not satisfied with delayed focus and an 82-69 loss.
"But why do we gotta wait until the last nine minutes?" said Knight, whose team has lost six of its last seven games. "Honestly, I'm not very pleased at all. What if you do that for 40 minutes? What's the outcome gonna be?"
After Tech committed only seven turnovers at Texas A&M Wednesday, the Red Raiders reverted back to the team that had a season-high 29 turnovers against Missouri Jan. 24. With Nebraska running a full court press early on, Tech had 15 turnovers in the first half and finished with 21.
"I think they were being too careless," Knight said. "We weren't attacking them. If you watch the team, we're trying to make these lofty passes. You can't attack the zone press like that. Teams press you because they want you to quit being aggressive."
With a little help from Rogdrick Craig catching fire, Tech went on a 20-6 run to come back from a 17-point deficit in the first half. But after halftime, Nebraska extended its lead to double-digits before Knight's bashing of the referees lifted his team with nine minutes remaining.
Knight said "don't read too much into" his decision to retort the controversial call.
With 9:49 to go in the game, Tech's Alan Voskuil was called for a defensive foul when he got tangled up with Nebraska's Chris Balham in the paint and the two fell to the ground. Knight lightly argued the call before he watched the replay, and then he erupted.
He charged across the floor to the opposite sideline and got in the official's face, shouting at the top of his lungs in disgust. He picked up a technical for yelling at the first official, then he continued to another, which is when he got the second technical and the ejection.
As Knight was being escorted by Robinson to the locker room, he spun around and sprinted back to mid-court to shout at the referees again.
"My job is to protect my players, if y'all didn't see what happened then that's your fault, just see what happened," he said. "My job is to protect my players, and you can only sit there and take so much. I gotta protect my boys and that's my job."
Nebraska coach Doc Sadler said he was unsure of the motive behind Knight's explosion, but whether it was for protection, frustration or inspiration, he understands that a coach with a struggling team will do anything to get a win.
"I have (argued to create a spark), and unfortunately I've been thrown out too," he said. "When you're in a ball game, you're just doing everything you can to try to do whatever to give your team a chance to win, and you're gonna fight man, and your players see that, and they respect it. I thought that his team responded very, very positively - the crowd definitely did."
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