FORT WORTH — TCU fans, do not be alarmed. This is February. This is college basketball.
Sometimes your team loses three in a row.
Guys get hurt. Some come back.
You win again, you get back on the NCAA bubble. Spring is near. This is college basketball.
“You’re battling. Everybody is,” TCU coach Jamie Dixon said after his team got its wheels back on track with a 75-72 victory against No. 19 Iowa State on Saturday at Schollmaier Arena.
“I know it’s a new world to TCU and talking about the tournament and going again and going two years in a row, but this is where I expect us to be and where we should be. As I said the other day, our goals haven’t changed.”
It would have been understandable if they had. Missing three players to season-ending injuries, a fourth that transferred mid-season and two more sidelined by injury in the past week, the Frogs came into Saturday with three straight losses.
But this time, they had Kouat Noi in uniform, in the lineup and in the zone.
The sophomore from Newcastle, Australia, dropped 20 points and 13 rebounds — 10 boards in the first 15 minutes of the game, in fact — in his first game back after sitting out against Oklahoma and Oklahoma State because of a bum ankle.
Springy and bouncy as usual, he made four of seven 3-pointers, getting TCU within 60-59 with 7:31 left and then ahead 64-62 with 6:15 left. His free throws with 21 seconds left provided the final margin.
“It was tough,” he said. “My first year here, I sat out too. It was tough not being out there with my team. But it was good to be out there and get an opportunity to win,”
Even if Noi hadn’t been at full health, his presence figured to give the Frogs a lift.
“He adds another element to us, somebody who can stretch the floor, long,” said Desmond Bane, who finished with 16 points. “He impacts us on defense, too, which allows us to get out and get some easy offense.”
But a double-double? Impressive. TCU is an interesting team when Noi is on the court. Dixon openly wondered if a certain committee takes note of that.
“I don’t know how much they look at it, but if you look at our thing, it’s pretty clear, when he hasn’t played, we haven’t been as good,” Dixon said. “But he’s going to play the rest of the year, so we can be pretty good.”
Speaking of the committee, the members can look at TCU’s record against ranked Iowa State. It’s 2-0 this year.
As much as Noi helped TCU on the court, that can help TCU with its NCAA tournament hopes with four games to go. The Frogs get two more ranked teams this year, Texas Tech and Kansas State, both in Fort Worth.
“A great win for us. Obviously a ranked team, a really good team,” Dixon said. “We’ve got two good wins against them. … We found a way against a really good team.”
One good way is to limit 3-pointers by the other team. Iowa State went only 2-for-20 beyond the arc, including two misses in the final seconds, the last a catch-and-shoot after 0.4 seconds were put back on the clock following a review after TCU botched an inbound pass with 1.1 seconds left.
“You need some breaks, too,” Dixon said. “You need some luck. They missed some open ones. But when you look, they’re a 3-point shooting team and they only had 20 of their 70 shots (from 3-point range), it means you probably weren’t giving them many good looks.”
Now what?
Well, do it again.
“That’s how this league goes,” Bane said. “You go through your ups and downs, but we’re going to fight, we’re going to keep fighting. We’ve got another one on Tuesday on the road, so we’re preparing for that one and on to the next one.”
The Frogs are at West Virginia on Tuesday night. They’ll have a healthy Noi on their side but not much room for error. Or time. It’s February. It’s college basketball.
