SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Texas guard Jordan Pope revealed after the Longhorns' 79-77 Sweet 16 loss to Purdue that he played the game with a broken foot.
"I think I can clear the air now," he said after the game. "Five minutes left against Gonzaga [in the second round]. I broke my foot, a complete break."
Despite the injury, Pope made a positive impact, scoring 12 points in 33 minutes as the Longhorns nearly pulled off an upset, falling on a tip-in by Trey Kaufman-Renn with 0.7 seconds left.
Over the past few days, Pope received constant treatment from the Texas training staff, he said, which was mostly an attempt to relieve the swelling in the foot -- an effort to reduce pain to give him a chance to play. Pope's hometown of Oakley, California, is about an hour and a half from San Jose, and he said the chance to play in a Sweet 16 in front of friends and family was too important to miss.
"I'll never have this opportunity again," he said. "I couldn't let that pass. I think I would have regretted that a lot if I would have."
Texas coach Sean Miller made it clear Pope would not have been given the chance to play if the training staff had determined that if by playing, he would have risked worsening the injury. After that, he said it was up to Pope whether he wanted to try to play.
"Watching him out there tonight is really remarkable, really was what he did, how he played under those conditions. I don't know how many guys that I've coached under these conditions on this stage would have chosen to play," Miller said. "It would have been very easy for him just to say, 'Make the Sweet 16. I'm not going to be 100%. I don't know how I'll look. And because of that, I can't go.' But he gave us everything and gave us the opportunity to win."
It's unclear if Pope will have to undergo surgery to repair the injury. Miller said that decision probably will be made in the coming days.
