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The Arizona basketball team has now lost back-to-back games. Arizona bowed to Texas Tech in overtime on Saturday, 78-75. Texas Tech star forward JT Toppin wrecked the Wildcats with a 31-point performance.
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Following the game, Arizona coach Tommy Lloyd praised Toppin for his dominance.
“I think the first thing he did is he did what he does, he got a couple of loose ball, rebound, offense rebound-type putbacks,” Lloyd said, per Arizona Desert Swarm. “We got him to miss the first shot, but he was able to capitalize and get putbacks on the second. He’s just really good at that. He said he’s a really good player. And he’s very opportunistic, which is a great skill to have.”
Toppin also grabbed 13 rebounds in the game, to finish the contest with another double-double. He leads the Big 12 in rebounding this season, while he sits in third in scoring.
“We were telling guys to be comfortable with coming from different angles and stuff like that. He made a few post moves down the stretch at the end of the game that kind of stood out, but other than that, it was more kind of loose balls, put backs and things like that. I thought for a lot of the game, we did a pretty decent job,” Lloyd added.
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Arizona is now 23-2 after losing back-to-back contests to Texas Tech and Kansas.
Arizona had no answers for JT Toppin on Saturday
© Aryanna Frank-Imagn Images
The Wildcats used a few different players to try and post up Toppin on Saturday. Nothing worked, as Toppin actually put together a performance for the ages in the Big 12.
“JT Toppin is only the 2nd player in Big 12 History with a 30+ point Double-Double vs an AP No. 1 Team,” the Big 12 Conference posted on X, formerly Twitter.
Following the game, Arizona players dissected what happened.
“I think it was his second chance points. He has a really quick second jump. He has great just sort of body placement in terms of the ball and tracking it down. He seems to always be in the right place at the right time. So again, it’s just kudos to him and the type of player that he is,” Arizona forward Tobe Awaka said postgame.
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The Wildcats will try to regroup, when they next play BYU on Wednesday. BYU has won back-to-back games.
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