The Texas A&M basketball team needs to get to the free throw line

After a brutal stretch through January and early February, the Texas A&M basketball team is finally back on track. The Aggies have responded to their eight-game losing streak by winning three of the last four, albeit against poor opponents. That said, they’re doing something right.

I could get into any number of reasons behind the Aggies’ winning ways — ball security, stout defense, and efficient offense are all among them.

One thing, however, that stands above the rest is A&M’s ability to get to the free-throw line in recent games. There has been a noticeable uptick for the Aggies, who haven’t had much consistency in that category all season long.

The Texas A&M basketball team needs to find a way to consistently reach the free-throw line and consistently make free-throws

You could consider getting to the free-throw line Texas A&M’s bread and butter so far in the 2021-22 season. The Aggies rank 45th in free-throws attempted per game with 20.4 per game, a number that has seen an uptick in the past couple of games.

Ironically, Texas A&M-Corpus Christi is second in the entire country in free-throws attempted per game, but that’s neither here nor there.

As mentioned, the Texas A&M Aggies are 45th, though their volume of free throws taken hasn’t necessarily translated to a high free-throw percentage. Unfortunately, A&M knocks down just 68.1% of their shots from the charity stripe, which ranks a disappointing 294th in the nation out of 358 teams.

In the past two wins, Texas A&M has shot more free throws (24 per game) at a higher percentage (75%) than its yearly averages. It’s no coincidence that both of these games finished in high scoring outputs and eventual wins.

The Aggies need to continue to do both of these things effectively — particularly knocking down their free throws — if they want to make this final push for the NCAA Tournament.

Part of this can come out of Henry Coleman and Tyrece Radford, both of whom are shooting under 70% from the free-throw line this year. If they can up their numbers, A&M might be in better shape come SEC Tournament time.