It's not so much about one particular game. It's about building your resume for the postseason, and this was a resume game for sure.
The problem for teams in Texas is that there is a strong possibility that the NCAA only awards 2 supers to us. Augie Garrido talked last year about how the NCAA is doing its best to eliminate teams from certain parts of the country (i.e. they only want 1 team from Texas getting to Omaha). He got bashed a lot around here for saying it, but he's right. And what that means is that Texas, A&M, TCU, Baylor, and Rice are all fighting for those 2 seeds. TCU and Rice have built-in advantages in that they play in weak conferences that they will absolutely destroy. So the Big 12 teams from Texas have to win as many non-conference games as they can, especially the ones against top-ranked teams.
Baylor, Texas, and A&M all have played or will play at least one game against both Rice and TCU, so it is crucial to win those games if you want one of those super regional seeds.