OU basketball…the way James Naismith envisioned it to be…
Okay, so I was wrong already… In a recent blog I made the statement that OU would fare well in the NCAA tournament because we would have already faced teams from the toughest conference in America. That reasoning along with my bracket went out the window after the first day.
Texas Tech loses to Butler (where the hell is Butler) Texas loses to a directional school from Iowa and West Virginia loses to a bunch of Lumberjacks from Texas (Seriously, you can’t make this stuff up, SFA’s mascot is the Lumberjack).
Not to be outdone Baylor does its standard first round belly flop by losing to a school with no players on athletic scholarship. I know we are talking Scott Drew here, but that is still embarrassing.
By the end of the first round the greatest conference in the history of college basketball had lost 57% of its games.
Hey, but wait a minute; I believe I see a silver lining for the Sooners…OU, KU and ISU used their Joe C. seeding gifts to salvage the day. These teams are each well-coached and will represent the conference well down the stretch. With the seeding mess that has produced all the upsets, I will be shocked if at least one of these teams does not make it to the final four.
As for OU, I like our chances. Granted living and dying by the three ball is not only nerve wracking, it is also dangerous, but I am telling you that there’s a chance. Regardless of how far we extend our season, this sure beats sitting home on the couch watching everyone else play.
Who knows…as this team gets more rest their shooting legs may return and we could have a legitimate shot at the final four.
Regardless of how this thing turns out, I like the fact that OU and Lon Kruger are doing it the right way…OU will have four seniors off this team that will graduate in May. In this “one and done era” where college basketball players seldom go to class, much less graduate, this may be a first.
I bet James Naismith would be really proud of how these Sooners are representing his game.
Boomer Sooner…