Rodney Terry breaks down difference between coaching young team vs. veterans

The Texas Longhorns earned a difficult win over the Oklahoma Sooners on Saturday. A lot of why Texas was able to win this game, according to head coach Rodney Terry, is that they’re experienced and know what is at stake.

During his press conference after the game, Terry explained just how important it is to have veteran players who know the team’s goals.

“These guys have played a lot of games, you know, and we’re playing deep into February right now and games like we played today–we’ll be in games like this the rest of the year,” Rodney Terry said.

“This is this time of year’s type of games. But, those guys, they’ve been great in terms of understanding what they’re playing for right now. Every game is an NCAA Tournament game. Every game is an opportunity for them to try to reach a goal that we had at the outset of the year was to try to compete for a Big 12 Championship and try to put ourselves in the best position going forward in postseason play and March.”

Texas has four more games left in the regular season, starting with No. 23 Iowa State on Tuesday night.

Rodney Terry praised Texas’ resilience

In close games, Texas has proven to be an incredibly difficult opponent. Because of that, Rodney Terry praised the Longhorns for their resilience.

“I’ve challenged these guys here, early February, really just start trying to play March basketball. Today was March basketball. You’re gonna be in games like this all year. In postseason play, where you’ve got to maybe not have your best day to day but you got to find a way to get it done in those 40 minutes. I thought this group again, they’ve been very resilient, all year long, in terms of fighting through adversity, had a chance to have the game won in regulation,” Terry said.

“We have to go play an extra five minutes. Hit the reset button and say we’re going to win this game with our defense. A lot of times in overtime, the team that comes out in the first minute of overtime and sets the tone with how they’re going to play both on offense and defense really finds a way to get it done in overtime. I thought our guys did that to start the overtime period.”