In an era defined by pace-and-space and dominated by the plethora of attempted threes, Texas A&M men’s basketball coach Buzz Williams goes by the old school handbook of getting points the hard way: in the paint. However, much to the surprise of everyone, including No. 10 Kentucky, No. 11 A&M came out the first half gunning for threes with everyone receiving the green light to shoot.

And it worked: the Maroon and White knocked down seven first half threes, already more than their average made threes a game — and on a 39% clip, a far cry from their 30.9% average.

As it seemed like A&M would pull away for its second win without star graduate guard Wade Taylor IV, the Wildcats came back with game-winning adjustments in the second half to hand the Aggies a second loss in a row.

Mark Pope’s brilliancy in the second half

While A&M was on a heater in the first twenty minutes, the Wildcats were stunned by the swarming Aggie defense. Especially with A&M’s switch-all, collapse down low defense, little to no clean threes were taken and those that were open came from Stephen Curry range. 

However, first-year Kentucky coach Mark Pope showed a snippet of what was to come in the second half as he drew up the perfect play to break A&M’s press, feeding the ball down low to sophomore forward Brandon Garrison and as Aggie players came to disrupt paint play, the Oklahoma State transfer kicked it in the corner to a wide open graduate G Jaxson Robinson for the easy three.

In the second half, he schemed and ran floppy action to have his shooters open on offball screens in the corner and with constant driving threats by junior G Otega Oweh, graduate G Lamont Butler and Robinson forcing help Aggie defense, freshman G Travis Perry and graduate G Koby Brea found themselves open for great looks, knocking three combined triples.

Great adjustments combined with Robinson’s hot hand mixed for a game-winning Wildcat formula.

Wade Taylor IV’s presence is sorely missed

Try as the Aggies might, replicating even just a smudge of Taylor’s production is a tall task, especially with how gifted his shot creation is — and they certainly could’ve used it in the second half to weather the two-man storm of Oweh and Robinson as the guard tandem hit A&M from everywhere from poster dunks to deep threes.

At the moment, the main duties have been given to senior G Zhuric Phelps who’s been on a streaky shooting performance. The SMU transfer’s three-ball hasn’t been his bread-and-butter and though he gets to the basket, he’s been shaky at the line. Fellow shot creator senior G Manny Obaseki got going early with nine first half points but only took two shots the rest of the way enroute to fouling out. 

Senior G Hayden Hefner has called his own number, mixing up the game with strong takes to the basket and a wide variety of threes. Though he’s been shooting more volume, it fell short against Kentucky, mustering a 2-for-8 performance, including just one made three in six attempts.

Though A&M has a range of shooters and paint takers in the backcourt, it still falls short of what Taylor has been able to accomplish.

The Payne Train

While A&M guards struggled shooting the ball, junior forward Pharrel Payne continued his hot streak as he compiled another double-digit performance with 15 points on a perfect 5-for-5 night. The Minnesota transfer has made himself a reliable weapon in Williams’ playbook as the lengthy 6-foot-9 forward bullied his way into the paint multiple times, including an and-one take against graduate center Amari Williams.

He’s also showcased an improved intangible skill set, knocking 50/50 balls back out for second chances and going up against downhill Oweh. Though on the other end of the poster, the hustle and defensive effort is exactly what A&M needs and he provides an efficient and down-low option that A&M should look to take advantage of in the absence of Taylor.

While the timetable for Taylor’s return is not certain, the Aggies have a lot of work cut out for them in solving their offensive problems and they’ll have another shot at it on Saturday, Jan. 18 as they defend home court against LSU.