A graduate assistant stood at the top of the key and lobbed shot after shot toward — but not directly at — the basket. Each time the ball bounced off the rim, 10 Texas Tech basketball players lunged for the rebound.

Coach Pat Knight promised Monday the Red Raiders will spend most of this week focusing on their defense and rebounding, two areas where the team has particularly struggled as it started Big 12 Conference play 2-5. So far he’s kept his word, with the Raiders hardly taking a shot through two days of practice.

Texas Tech's Brad Reese dunks ahead of Oklahoma's Cade Davis during the second half of an NCAA college basketball game Saturday, Jan. 23, 2010, in Lubbock, Texas (AP Photo/Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, Zach Long)

“Offensively we played really well last week in both games, but we’ve gotten back to not guarding anybody,” Knight said. “I really thought the way we were going on offense, if we could have gotten a stop two or three different times in both games the outcome could have been different.”

Tech is last in the league in scoring defense, giving up an average of 74.7 points per game, the most of any team in the conference. It’s 10th in field goal percentage defense, as its opponents make 42.4 percent of their shots.

Knight was visibly angry after Tech’s 85-70 loss at Texas A&M on Saturday, even skipping the postgame press conference and calling the players back into the locker room for a second postgame meeting before boarding the bus to the airport. After watching tape of the game, he said things looked even worse.

“It’s nothing technical; it’s just simple stuff, getting into the ball, ball pressure, being in the right position,” Knight said. “It’s an effort deal. I have drills and everything that can take care of that.”

The players realize how bad things have become since dropping from the rankings Jan. 11. They held an hour-long, players-only meeting after practice Monday. About half a dozen remained on the court well after practice Tuesday and continued shooting on their own.

Forward Brad Reese said instead of coming back from deficits to win close games, as it did in nonconference play, Tech has begun letting wins slip away.

“It’s been a tough week,” Reese said. “We’re letting games get away from us down the stretch.”

He thinks that can change.

The first step will be to stop making excuses. Knowing they are one of the smallest teams in the conference, Tech seemed to accept that it would be beat out for rebounds.

While the team is sixth overall with an average of 37.5 boards per game, its opponents average 38.4, the highest opponent average of any Big 12 team.

“We know we’re small, but we have to hit the boards hard,” Reese said. “We have to keep working at getting rebounds, the little fundamentals of defense so we can get better when we get to Oklahoma State on Saturday.”

Tech had no problem motivating itself to prove opponents wrong early in the season, and that confidence led to big-time wins. Knight wants to see that kind of pride back in his team’s defense; he said it will help bring down opponents’ scoring averages and bring up the number of Tech wins.

“When you’re sitting at 2-5, now you’re back to being an under dog,” Knight said. “That shouldn’t be any problem, getting these kids motivated.”

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