Bohls: Are these undefeated, No. 2-ranked Longhorns actually ranked too low?

While Chris Beard maintained that Texas didn’t play its best game of the early season, the Longhorns did more than enough good things to hold off a talented No. 7-ranked Creighton team 72-67 on Thursday night.

And the question has to be asked.

Is Texas ranked too low? Even at No. 2 in the country.

Hmmm, it’s a thought, even if a premature one.

But the team’s probably right where it belongs even though the unbeaten Longhorns are 6-0, have now added another win over a top-10 opponent to its résumé on top of the 19-point trouncing of No. 2 Gonzaga two weeks ago and are finding different ways to stay in the win column.

Like offense down the stretch. Like critical ball security. Like free throws in crunch time.

Texas did receive eight first-place votes in the most recent Top 25, but Houston (7-0) is also unbeaten after blistering Norfolk State 100-52 behind 17 3-pointers even though the Cougars haven't played a ranked opponent. The Longhorns have and they’ll get another chance to prove their worth soon. On Tuesday they will head to New York City to face No. 16 Illinois (5-1) in Madison Square Garden.

“I don’t think either team played their A-game tonight,” Beard said. “We have a lot of respect for Creighton. But we’ve got to play a lot better than that. We’ve played 80 minutes of basketball against two teams we think are really, really good.”

And that includes Texas, a defensive-minded club that is suddenly pushing the ball like crazy and sporting an offense its defense can be proud of.

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What’s not to like so far?

ESPN authority Fran Fraschilla likes what he’s seen, but notes that the Longhorns haven’t faced any bumps on the road. Or hardly even ventured out on that road, for that matter.

“They’re good, but they haven’t gone on the road yet,” Fraschilla said, rightfully excluding a 73-48 tuneup over Northern Arizona in Edinburg a week ago. “They’re a top-10 team for sure. Their chemistry is so much better.”

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Texas continues to impress after beating a veteran Bluejays team (6-2) that is the Big East preseason favorite and that was coming off a grueling trip to Hawaii even though that sounds mutually exclusive. While on the island, Creighton won two of three at the Maui Invitational against Texas Tech and Arkansas before falling by two to Arizona, so Thursday’s win is yet another feather in Texas’ cap.

Not that Beard wants his players’ heads to get too big for that cap.

As he put it, “I don’t think we’ve proven anything. We’re just a team that’s trying to get better. That’s not the sexiest answer, but it’s true. It’s December. You get to February or March, you can get to proving things. We’re just kind of chipping away.”

Creighton chipped away at a lead that Texas held for 32½ minutes at Moody Center, cutting the deficit to three in the final 11 seconds even though the Longhorns were in control almost the entire game. Texas suffocated the normally premier outside shooting attack of the Bluejays, limiting them to four 3-pointers in 27 tries. That included marksman Baylor Scheierman, the South Dakota State gunner who had hit 19 treys in Creighton’s first seven games but was stymied until the very end.

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Scheierman, a 6-foot-7 guard, was off his game, thanks to a pressuring Texas defense that blanked him on his first nine attempts. Not until the final 3:33 did he connect, eventually hitting three of 13, including one shot from the corner where he was literally falling out of bounds.

Those were enough to apply some heat on Texas down the stretch, but Marcus Carr, who was spectacular with 19 points, five rebounds and five assists, and Brock Cunningham each drained two free throws in the final 10.2 seconds to seal the victory.

Beard said he had “zero concern about Brock and Marcus making free throws after a timeout” and even joked that some observers might have wondered why he called timeouts as if to ice his own players.

Ice water, more like it.

“We talk about that every single practice and how one of us will have to go knock down free throws,” Carr said. “We take it very seriously.”

Creighton got the message, but will be better off for it.

“Hats off to Texas. They’ve got a heckuva team,” Creighton coach Greg McDermott said. “My kid (Doug, a San Antonio Spur) just walked in the locker room. He’s one of the best shooters in the NBA, and he misses 60% of his 3-point shots. The reality is you are going to have nights. Baylor has nights where he makes six out of nine, and then there are nights like tonight. We don’t ever want him to stop shooting.”

That was one of several things Texas got right on this night.

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The team held its own on the glass, got balanced scoring with five players in double digits and outraced the Bluejays downcourt for a 20-5 edge in fast-break points, Texas’ stock in trade. Two of them came in the last minute from Tyrese Hunter on an effective bounce pass in the open floor from big man Christian Bishop, a former Bluejay at that.

So is the 6-foot-7 Bishop a point guard now?

“I know CB would like to,” Carr said.

He’ll have to really push it since McDermott is a big admirer of the backcourt tandem Beard has now in Carr and Hunter.

“Their guards played terrific,” he said. “With Chris Beard coaching ‘em, they’re one of the best backcourts in the country.”

Incredibly, the Longhorns were guilty of just three turnovers the entire game, a rare happenstance that had them predictably beating their chests a bit. Granted, Creighton doesn’t pressure the ball all that much, but the stat is still impressive.

That prompted Beard to remember one game he coached in the 2000-01 season when one of his players stepped out of bounds on a corner three for the team’s lone turnover to deny the team a flawless game.

“Still pisses me off,” deadpanned Beard, ever the perfectionist. “We’ve come close. I think it was a Seminole (State) College game. I think it was Sean Mason.”

Not that it still doesn’t irk him.

On this night, however, hardly anything else did.

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: No. 2 Texas holds off No. 7 Creighton, but are Horns ranked too low?