AUSTIN, Texas (KBTX) – With just less than six minutes to play, Texas coach Rodney Terry ran down the Moody Center sideline towards the official, six fingers waving in the air.

To his right, the Texas A&M men’s basketball team had taken a page out of a football defensive coordinator’s playbook and stacked a 3-3 defense at the top of Texas’ 3-point line. The rules of basketball, however, say that’s one too many on the court.

A technical foul that turned into a five-point play for Texas became a black eye on the 13th-ranked Aggies. The Longhorns rode the momentum shifting play to a record 22-point comeback win over A&M, 70-69.

“It gave us a chance to score without having to be guarded. You can’t guard that free-throw line and we’ve got a guy that can make free throws,” Terry said with a grin after the rivalry win.

Less than an minute earlier, A&M guard Wade Taylor IV had dribbled around a Texas defender, stepped back behind the arc and hit an off-balance 3-pointer to put the Aggies up by 14. It wasn’t quite the same as the deep shot Taylor hit there minutes into the second half that put the Aggies up by a game-high 22, but it extended the A&M lead, no less.

After an errant pass from Taylor turned the ball over to the Longhorns, a trio of Aggie players stood from the front of the scorers table to make their entrance into the game. Somebody failed to exit.

As soon as Texas guard Tramon Mark felt the ball placed in his hands, he fired it to fellow guard Julian Larry, initiating Terry’s march to the nearest official. Taylor made his best effort to run off the court without being noticed, but couldn’t evade the punishment. There wasn’t any indication after the game who was supposed to sub out in that situation, as Williams declined to comment on the play.

“I think you’ll have to ask the coordinator of officials,” Williams said. “I don’t want to — that’s the best way for me to handle it.”

The five-point play sparked a 20-5 Texas run that closed out the comeback that tied Texas’ largest, set in 2013. Needing two points to pick up their first leadoff the game, Texas went their veteran guard Mark, who drove down the left side of the lane and launched a runner that kissed of the glass and fell through the net with three seconds remaining.

Mark has made a living off downing the Aggies. In two games against A&M while with Arkansas last season, he posted point totals of 35 and 26 and hit a buzzer-beating shot for the Razorbacks.

“I don’t know what it is, actually,” Mark said with a laugh. “I don’t know what it is. When the ball comes to me last second, it’s a good shot going up.”

A&M’s last hope was a near half-court heave by Taylor that clanked off the rim and fell astray.

Texas had only one attempt, which was missed, from the charity stripe in a first half that was uncharacteristically dominant for the Aggies. Two slow starts this month required double-digit comebacks, including an 11-point rally against Ole Miss on Wednesday. Williams said prior to Saturday’s rivalry matchup he wanted to see the same execution in the opening 20 minutes of the game.

The Aggies answered with eight first-half 3-pointers which led to 43 first-half points. Only A&M’s 44 first-half points against Alabama bested the total in conference play, to date.

The Aggies finished the game hitting a season-high 12 from behind the arc and at 52% clip and dominated the rebounding battle 43-27. A&M’s 18 offensive rebounds led to 20 second-chance points.

In the second half, the Aggies sent Texas to the free-throw line 16 times, with 14 falling through the net. Beyond the pair that Johnson hit for the substitution violation, Aggie forward Henry Coleman III was hit with a technical foul early in the second half for comments to an official. Both of the penalty tries were hit.

Over the last two games, A&M has not had more than nine free throw attempts, well below their 25.1 per game average. Saturday, the Aggies hit only three of their eight attempts.

Williams again recommended questions on free throws be asked of the director of officials.

“There’s a lot of lessons for us to learn,” Williams said of the game as a whole. “We’ve been on the other side of this the last couple of weeks and I don’t think that, at this level, you can ever think that anything is over. It’s never as easy as you think. And, at times in the second half, we weren’t accountable for what we have to do.”

Taylor finished with a game-high 15 points, followed by 13 from guard Manny Obaseki, who sat for eight minutes through the second half of the game. Williams declined to comment on the junior guard’s reduction in playing time after the break.

Johnson netted 30 for the Longhorns, including a 4 for 10 clip from behind the arc and a perfect 10 for 10 from the free-throw line.

The win, complete with a court-side trophy presentation, was revenge for the game won by the Aggies earlier this month in Reed Arena and the not “nice words” the A&M players were chirping throughout Saturday’s game, Johnson said.

“It meant a lot to us, especially just getting the win because it’s the next game, but they were talking trash, especially the deficit of the loss,” he said. “Just going into halftime, we knew we couldn’t go out like that.”

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