Lubbock, Texas ? Pat Knight knows he can always turn to his famous father to talk about coaching.
On Thursday, though, the young Knight didn’t call on Bob Knight. Instead he turned to a fan to help his Texas Tech players who were missing layup after layup in Tech’s 69-55 victory over Stephen F. Austin.
After Texas Tech botched as many as 15 layups, Knight scoured the stands near the bench and invited a youngster to join a team huddle.
Knight asked the boy whether he could make layups. The boy said he could.
“I was just tired of having 18- or 21-year-olds miss layups that a 12-year-old could hit, so I brought a 12-year-old in to let them know that he could hit layups,” Knight said. “He’s 12, and he can hit layups, so why can’t you when you’re 18 to 21?”
That seemed to make an impact the rest of the second half.
Alan Voskuil and Darko Cohadarevic scored 12 points each to help Tech beat the Lumberjacks.
Each team struggled early to make baskets but the Lumberjacks shot poorly throughout the game. Stephen F. Austin hit only 19 of its 72 attempts from the field, or 26 percent. The Lumberjacks made only four of their 23 attempts from beyond the arc.
“That was the worst shooting performance we’ve ever had,” Lumberjacks coach Danny Kaspar said. “We shot 10 more shots than they did and had six less baskets, so give some credit to their defense. You have to stick the ball in the hole.”
Texas Tech (10-4) finally put some distance between it and the Lumberjacks, using an 8-2 run to start the second half that was capped by Voskuil’s first bucket of the game to put the Red Raiders up 37-24.
A layup by Mike Singletary with 8:44 remaining put the Red Raiders up 52-36, and SFA couldn’t cobble together a comeback.
