Reducing turnovers key to a season turnaround for Aggie basketball

To turn around its basketball season, Texas A&M must reduce its turnovers.

That’s the message first-year coach Buzz Williams has hammered to the struggling Aggies (3-5) following a 60-50 loss to Texas, in which A&M committed turnovers on one third of its possessions.

Williams said nine of the turnovers led directly to Texas dunks. That shows that although the Aggies shot just 27.3 percent from the field and 53.8 percent from the foul line, they still could have won had they limited their turnovers.

The Aggies will demonstrate whether they’ve gotten the message — or at least to what degree — when they face Texas A&M-Corpus Christi (4-5) on Sunday at 5 p.m. at Reed Arena.

“I feel like we have to treat every team with the same amount of respect no matter the name of their jersey,” said junior guard Savion Flagg, who is averaging 10.4 points. “I feel like it’s a game we’re supposed to win. We can’t go in there with that mentality. We have to go in there with the mentality that we’re playing the national team. We have to go out and play as hard as we can.”

Flagg is right. The Aggies cannot overlook any opponent. They’re mired in a four-game losing streak. That includes a 67-62 loss to Fairfield (2-7).

Lia Musgrave, TexAgs

Savion Flagg and the Aggie basketball team aren’t overlooking the Islanders.

In that game they committed 12 turnovers, which was still too high considering the level of competition. But at least it was better than the Aggies’ 15.3 average that ranks 282 in the nation.

A&M-Corpus Christi actually averages more turnovers (15.9), but that’s of less concern to Williams. He said the Aggies were focused more on solving their own problems than anything their opponents are doing.

Therefore, to solve the turnover issue, Williams stressed ball security even more than usual in practices this week.

“We’re making sure we’re taking care of the ball,” Flagg said. “We’re making punishment of turnovers. Not anything cruel but making sure we’re accountable.”

Added freshman guard Andre Gordon:  “We’ve just got to put the ball in people’s hands that can handle the ball and not turn the ball over.”

There have been a few bright spots of late. Leading scorer Josh Nebo continues to play well. Flagg has shot 47 percent over the last two games, which indicates he may be breaking out of a shooting slump. He’d shot 30 percent in the previous five games combined. Also, freshman forward Emanuel Miller had 14 rebounds against Texas.

“I was really encouraged with E-man on the glass,” Williams said. “Fourteen rebounds in a college game as a freshman is really good. That maybe prevented some shots from Texas because he was such a force on the glass.”

However, shooting remains a serious issue. Despite Flagg’s recent improvement, the Aggies are ranked just 336th in the nation with a shooting percentage of 37.6.

Williams said that frigid shooting can at least in part be traced back to the turnover problems.

“Part of the reason our field goal percentage is atrocious is because we never get into a flow,” he said. “We never get in a rhythm offensively. We get a shot, we get a shot, we turn it over.”

Finding that rhythm and reducing turnovers would be the first step in the Aggies making a turnaround.