A sour, not sweet finish: Struggling Texas eliminated as Louisville rolls on to Sweet 16

Minutes after Texas' basketball season ended on Monday night, Longhorns head coach Vic Schaefer offered congratulations. And an apology.

During his postgame press conference, Schaefer first commended Louisville for its 73-51 win in the second round of the NCAA Tournament. He thought the fifth-seeded Cardinals needed to be congratulated for "how hard and competitive that they played today."

But wait, there's more.

"And then in the second breath, I need to apologize to the University of Texas for today and how my team played," Schaefer added. "I'm accountable for that, and I'm the head coach. You know, it's my responsibility to make sure that we play a lot better than that. This university deserves better than that and I'm accountable for that."

Fourth-seeded Texas never led Monday night. The lopsided loss closed out the Longhorns' season; Louisville (25-11) advanced to the Sweet 16 in Seattle. The 22-point loss was Texas' fourth-worst ever in an NCAA Tournament game.

"Only one stat I need to see," Schaefer said. He pointed out that the Longhorns forced only two turnovers in the first half. Texas had been forcing 20.2 turnovers per game, the 17th-best average in the country out of 350 Division I teams.

The Longhorns trailed by 14 points at halftime, 37-23.

The Longhorns (26-10) had plenty of offensive issues in the first half as well. The teams battled to a 16-16 tie in the first quarter, but Louisville opened the second session with a 9-0 run and never looked back. The Cardinals went on to outscore Texas by a 21-7 margin in the session.

Texas missed 12 of its 15 field goals in the second quarter and all three of its 3-pointers. Over that 10-minute stretch, eight Longhorns played. Only forward DeYona Gaston scored.

The Louisville lockdown occurred with senior guard Mykasa Robinson sitting on the bench. A three-time member of the ACC all-defensive team, she was whistled for two fouls in the first quarter.

"Everyone stepped up," Robinson said of that second quarter. "They played great. I love this team, so anything we do together, I'm just happy for everyone."

Texas never got closer than nine points in the second half. Louisville, meanwhile, led by as many as 27.

The Longhorns struggled to make any sort of shot — Texas missed on nine of the 10 3-pointers it took and made only 60% of its free throws. The Longhorns even struggled to a 7-for-22 performance on layup attempts.

"We just didn't make enough shots," sophomore point guard Rori Harmon said. "The ones we probably should make, they didn't go in. I wouldn't say our offense was that stagnant because we got good looks, but you know, we just didn't make them all."

Added Shay Holle: "I would say it was a focus thing for sure. We got good looks and we were getting in the right positions to get the shots we wanted, but we just weren't finishing what we needed to."

Gaston's 12 points led Texas, but the all-conference honoree was benched 37 seconds into the game after she picked up an early foul. She didn't return until Louisville was leading by six points in the second quarter.

"I wasn't going to get her a second (foul)," Schaefer said. "I just had to try to get her through over there, and I thought we weathered it a little bit. But you know, she's 5-out-of-10, had five rebounds and 12 points. That all looks good on paper, but there's more to the game than that."

Schaefer also downplayed his use of senior guard Sonya Morris, who played only 11 minutes and did not appear in the third quarter as Louisville stretched its lead to 21 points. Morris, who had missed 10 games because of an intramuscular hematoma in her quad before making her return to the team Saturday night, was averaging 11.8 points per game and had been the team's top 3-point threat.

"I played the kids that obviously I felt like I needed to play," Schaefer said.

After the game, Morris was caught on camera confronting Louisville guard Hailey Van Lith in the handshake line. Van Lith declined to discuss the incident in her postgame media availability, saying she didn't want to shift the focus away from Louisville's win.

Van Lith scored 21 points. She made eight of her 15 shots.

"Yeah, she's just a really skilled player," Holle said. "She's uber competitive. She works really hard. She's always moving. We respect her a lot. She was definitely a focus going into this game."

While speaking to reporters afterwards, Schaefer used some form of the word "tough" a dozen times. Van Lith said it was a team goal to "go out and prove that we're the same Louisville tough that this program has been for a long time now."

Louisville scored 38 points in the paint in Monday. Louisville coach Jeff Walz noted that the Cardinals won the rebounding battle 42-34 despite grabbing seven fewer rebounds than Texas in the opening quarter.

Notes: Harmon, who left the game in the final minutes with a leg injury, had 10 points and nine rebounds. She finished her sophomore season averaging a school-record 7.4 assists per game. ... Freshman Ndjakalenga Mwenentanda scored 10 points for Texas. ... Louisville will meet Ole Miss on Friday. The No. 1 (Stanford), No. 3 (Duke) and No. 4 (Texas) teams in the "Seattle 4" region were all eliminated in the second round.