TCU wasted no time making sure this season opener looked nothing like the last one.
A year after getting stunned by New Orleans to start the year and then losing its starting center to a season-ending injury, the Horned Frogs opened Monday night with a far cleaner result, rolling past Lindenwood 98-59 at Schollmaier Arena.
The tone was set early, and TCU’s new-look roster kept building on it. Senior point guard Brock Harding said the difference was obvious from the opening minutes.
“I feel like we came out with a different intensity than we did last year,” senior point guard Brock Harding said. “Coming back we knew what that feeling was. I thought we set the tone early, had some hiccups here and there, but just a different feeling from the jump.”
Junior forward Micah Robinson led the way with 19 points, while Harding added 17 points and five assists. The Horned Frogs did most of their damage before halftime, when they pulled away and never let the Lions back in the picture.
Robinson said last season’s opener stuck with the team.
“Last year we saw the impact of how that game impacted us later in the season,” Robinson said. “So us knowing that this year, we knew that these games matter just as much as the games in conference late in March and April.”
The victory also gave Jamie Dixon his 200th win at TCU. He’s now five shy of the program record, which belongs to Buster Bannon.
“We’ve done some good things, but we want to do more,” Dixon said. “We want to get to a Final Four, but we’ve got work to do. I think we have a good group to do it.”
Robinson and senior forward Xavier Edmonds looked like the kind of tandem Dixon is counting on. The two were TCU’s best players down the stretch in March Madness, and they picked up right where they left off.
Edmonds helped create several of Robinson’s biggest looks in the first half, including a post double-team that led to an open 3-pointer and a 10-5 TCU lead. Not long after that, Edmonds found Robinson on a baseline cut for an alley-oop that got the crowd going. Then Edmonds showed his own scoring touch, using a behind-the-back dribble to shake loose before finishing a tough layup, and later powering in another basket to push the Horned Frogs ahead 41-27 with 6:04 left before halftime.
Robinson had 14 points in the opening half and Edmonds added 9 as TCU took a 57-37 lead into the break. Harding finished the half with 12 after repeatedly getting to the line, where he made seven of eight attempts. TCU shot 53% from the field in the first half and hit six 3-pointers.
Harding’s scoring came late in the half, but the first stretch belonged to Robinson and Edmonds. Their chemistry stood out, and it gave TCU a steady rhythm against a Lindenwood team that never found a way to slow the pace.
Among the newcomers, junior guard Trent Lincoln and sophomore forward DJ Thomas made the strongest first impressions. Lincoln, the No. 1 junior college player from last year’s recruiting cycle, scored 12 points, hit two 3-pointers and handled backup point guard duties behind Harding. He also gave TCU a burst of athleticism attacking the rim.
The Horned Frogs needed that bench scoring, too, because sophomore guard Gavin Sykes was out with an ankle sprain suffered in a preseason scrimmage.
Thomas had a quieter first half, missing a few layups around the basket, but he settled in after the break and finished with 19 points, 13 of them in the second half. He scored inside, knocked down a 3-pointer and added four steals while fitting into TCU’s aggressive defensive approach.
That kind of frontcourt depth matters for a team that didn’t have much of it last season. Dixon had to lean heavily on Edmonds and former Horned Frog David Punch, now at Texas, and foul trouble was always part of the equation.
“DJ was as good as we had all summer long,” TCU coach Jamie Dixon said. “He can score, he’s a good defender. We need to get him to rebound more, but he’s very skilled offensively.”
Edmonds only played 14 minutes after picking up his fourth foul in the first minute of the second half, but TCU hardly slowed down. The lead grew as large as 37, 81-44, with Edmonds on the bench, and Thomas plus junior center Ryan Hunt helped give the Horned Frogs a much deeper front line.
There’s still room to clean things up, especially defensively, but TCU showed a ceiling that looked higher than last year’s team, which reached the second round of the NCAA Tournament.
The Horned Frogs return to Schollmaier Arena on Friday for a 7 p.m. matchup with Southern on ESPN+.
“We can better, and we’re going to be better on Friday,” Dixon said.
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