3 reasons Texas A&M basketball topples top-seeded Houston Cougars in March Madness
How Texas A&M basketball beats Houston: Wade Taylor nearly beat them by himself last time
In the previous game against the Houston Cougars, the Aggies scored 66 points. 34 of those came from Wade Taylor.
Yes, you read that right. Thirty-four of the sixty-six points against the nation's top defense came from one man.
Despite the loss, Wade Taylor IV had one of the best performances of the season against Houston.
— 32 Analytics (@32_Analytics) December 18, 2023
▪️ 34 points
▪️ 6/14 from three
▪️ 3 steals
🔴 97.04 game grade
Our model has graded over 130,000 individual performances in college basketball over the past 2 seasons.
Only 5… pic.twitter.com/rx54xyXWXm
This is back before it started to look like Wade was wearing down. He has since regained his form, but there has been much less of a need for him to put the team on his back quite like he did in this game or in the first matchup against Arkansas, where he scored 40.
This was a solo effort, through and through. But it had to be. Tyrece Radford did not play against the Cougars, and recently-emerging superstar Manny Obaseki only logged 9 total minutes—and 0 total points.
No other player for Texas A&M basketball recorded even ten points. Jace Carter and Hayden Hefner each notched 7 points.
I see this matchup going quite differently for the Aggies. Wade is back to where he was, like I said, but adding Boots and this current version of Manny changes the calculus for this game significantly. This three-headed monster at guard is different than anything the Cougars have seen this season—and it just might be enough to put the Ags over the top.