Oklahoma Basketball fell to the Virginia Cavaliers by the score of 63-51 this past Sunday. Now the Sooners have to get ready for an intriguing off-season.
Oklahoma Basketball officially finished the year with a 20-14 record (7-11 in the Big 12). They played a tough regular season schedule, ranking 16th in the nation, (The Big-12 had four top teams in the top 10 and six in the top 20) and they’re the only team in the whole nation to have a win from each team in the power 5 conference.
The Sooners were off to a good start this season going 11-1 until they started conference play.
Their 7-11 record in conference play, and their struggles late made many people question if Oklahoma would or should make the big dance, especially after their early exit in the Big-12 conference tournament.
Their key wins against Wofford, Florida, and Kansas, along with their strength of schedule and having a win in each major conference proved enough to snag a 9th seed in the March Madness tournament.
They played 8th seeded Ole Miss in the round of 64, routing them by the score of 95-72. The 95 points scored were a tournament high for the first round. The blowout win came in large part to the amazing play of Kristian Doolittle who was talked about being the breakout player of the tournament thanks to his stat line of 19 points, 15 rebounds, and 5 assists.
Doolittle’s play was key for the Sooners in the round of 32 against Virginia. The team needed to try to use him in isolation to break down and penetrate the defense in order to make Oklahoma’s offense more efficient.
Here’s how the game went down. The first half was a game of runs. Virginia jumped to a 7 point lead early causing coach Lon Kruger to call an early timeout. Oklahoma then eventually took control of the game and had a lead thanks to Virginia failing to score on 8 straight possessions. Oklahoma then made only one of their next twelve shots and was down by the score of 15-35 with three minutes left, before being down 22-31 at halftime.
More from Busting Brackets
- Oregon Basketball: Projected starting lineup and depth chart for 2023-24
- Big East Basketball: Ranking all head coaches going into 2023-24 season
- Florida State Basketball: Is Seminoles roster good enough to win in 2023-24?
- SEC Basketball: 10 potential additions for the league if they ever expanded
- NCAA Basketball Recruiting: Analyzing top 5 teams for 4-star PG Jeremiah Johnson
Basketball is a game of runs. Both teams will eventually go on one, but the better team, and great teams know how to make their runs last longer, and how to stop the opposing teams Run. Virginia did a good job of limiting OU’s run’s in the first half.
Virginia then put it in cruise control and won by the score of 62-51. Oklahoma had a hard time against Virginia’s defense, often times running their offense at or beyond the three-point line and they couldn’t get much penetration into the zone.
I felt as if Oklahoma should’ve been more aggressive attacking the basket after receiving a screen. I would’ve liked Oklahoma to be the aggressors early and look to attack coming off of the screen. They seemed intimidated by the hedging defender and would pick up the ball and make the “safe” play instead of attacking the defenders hip to try to attack the basket. If the ball handler didn’t fell as if he had a solid lane to drive in, he should’ve kept his dribble and attempted to drag his defender with him to create an easy pass to the potential roll man. Often times the guard would take a couple dribbles and pick up the ball. Oklahoma shot ZERO first half free throws due to their passive play.
Oklahoma amazingly somehow shot more free-throws than Virginia with 6 attempts, making five. But they lost the rebound battle by the score of 26-34, (Virginia had more offensive rebounds as well with 7) and OU also had more turnovers than the Cavaliers did as well.
Oklahoma just had a bad shooting night, in credit to Virginia’s stellar defense. Oklahoma never got anything easy, and shot 19-52 for 36.5% from the field. The teams senior Christian James went 4-13 scoring 13 points with 5 rebounds and 3 assists. The teams second leading scorer for the game just so happened to be their second leading scorer in the season in Brady Manek who also scored 13 points while shooting 5-13. My appointed X-factor player in Kristian Doolittle only tallied 8 points, 5 rebounds, and 2 assist on 4-10 shooting.
So whats next for Oklahoma?
247 Sports currently has Oklahoma pegged with the 16th best recruiting class in the nation. They’ve signed two 4 star players so far, in point guard De’Vion Harmon, and big man Victor Iwuakor.
They have currently two 3-star commits in Forward Jalen Hill, and Center Corbin Merritt. They also have a two star guard signed in Alondes Williams.
They also have a Hard Commit (Player has verbally said he intends on playing for Oklahoma and isn’t actively looking elsewhere) in 6’8″ 195 pound power forward Anyang Garang out of Australia. He would be a three star player.
Along with those new commits (and possibly more??) Oklahoma will also have transfer guard Austin Reaves who came to Oklahoma after leaving Wichita State. He had to sit out his junior year after transferring. So what will Reaves bring to the table? In 21.5 minutes played per game, Reaves put up 8.1 points a game, along with 3.1 rebounds and 2 assists a contest on .450 FG%, and an automatic green light worthy .425% from 3 point land for the Shockers. Reaves will also bring March Madness experience to this Sooners squad next year as well, as he had been there two years at Wichita St.
This recruiting class, along with Brady Manek, Kristian Doolittle, and all of the other Sooners young key players who got post season experience should have a successful season next year, and will hopefully become a force in not only Big-12 conference play, but in the March Madness tournament as well.