The Sooner Men's BB Team travels to GA looking for 1st SEC Win !

[OUBeliever56A]

The 13-2 Oklahoma Sooners Basketball Team (ranked 17th) travels to Athens, GA to play the 13-2 Georgia Bulldogs (ranked RV35) on Saturday Janury 11th in a 5 PM CST Tipoff. The Sooners are 0-2 in SEC Play while Georgia is 1-1. Oklahoma has lost at #5 Alabama and lost at home to #10 Texas A&M on Wednesday. Georgia lost Ole Miss on the road and defeated #6 Kentucky in Athens on Tuesday.

Georgia plays 5 guards (6'4" to 6'5") with four averaging 10 points a game and one averaging 8.5. All five can make a "three' with #1 Leffer and #0 Cain with 20 or more made 3's. All five play over 21 minutes a game as the Bulldogs play 3 guards 120 minutes and maybe sometimes run 4 guards out on the floor. Georgia also plays 5 'bigs" regularly with all of them between 6'8" and 6'11". Newell, #14, is by far the best offensive player of the five as he averages 15.5 points per game with 6.9 rebounds per game in 27 minutes, as a freshman, with his 6'11" frame. The other four averge between 6.7 and 1.6 points and 4.9 and 2.7 rebounds a game. The other four play from 20 to 10 minutes each and can fill all 80 minutes at the two 'big' lineup spots for Georgia.

Oklahoma will have to have an answer for Newell on the both ends of the floor while staying close to the 3 guards that are playing out on the arc. Georgia will protect the rin with blocks as well.

Georgia outrbounds OU about 6 rebounds per game, 39.2 to 33.0. Georgia earns about 31% of their rebounds on the offensive end with OU earning 28% of the boards on offense.

Georgia takes care of the ball with 13.4 turnovers ith 14.8 assists and 8.5 steals per game for a Ratio of 1.74. OU is a little better with only 11.6 turnovers per game with 14.7 assist and 8.9 steals a game. That equals a strong 2.03 Ratio.

Georgia shoots 48.7% from the field - 57.4 from 2-pt and 33.9 from 3-pt. The Bulldogs make 7.2 "three's" and shoots 21.5 of them a game. For the season (15 games each), Georgia has shot one more shot from the field.

Oklahoma shoots 48.8% from the field - 57.7 from 2-pt and 37.6 from 3-pt. The Sooners make 9.5 "three's and shoots 25.2 of them a game.

From the charity stripe, Georgia makes 72.6% of 23.9 freebies a game while OU makes 81.0% of 21 freebies per game. In the end both teams make 17 free throws a game.

So, once again, the Sooners have to continue to shoot well from 3-point territory and and play well enough inside the paint to not be outmuscled on the boards and inside. I am not sure Oklahoma will be able to get to the rim againt Georgia with their guards. If they can't more pressure is put on the Sooners outside shooting. Because of the play inside, fouls on the Sooners 'bigs' will be an important thing to watch. But I would say that Godwin has played very well in the last two SEC games considering the opponents size and depth. It wil be interesting to see if Godwin or if Moore gets the assignment of guarding Newell. If the Sooners can slow him down it can help the effort a great deal.

I do not know who will be favored in the game come Saturday afternoon. But the game will require a good effort for 40 minutes for the Sooners to get their 1st win in the SEC. The Sooners do need a win badly on Saturday.

Good luck to the Sooners against Georgia.

Boomer Sooner!

[OUBeliever56A]

Here is the Sooner staff writers article about the Sooner Men's Basketball Team playing at Georgia today at 5 PM CST.

https://soonersports.com/news/2025/1/10 ... ay-at-5-ct

Saturday's game will be televised by ESPN2 with John Schriffen (play-by-play) and Perry Clark (analyst) announcing. It will air on the Sooner Sports Radio Network (KRXO 107.7 FM The Franchise in Oklahoma City; KTBZ 1430 AM in Tulsa; Varsity Radio App) with Toby Rowland (play-by-play) and Kevin Henry (analyst) on the call.

Good luck to the Sooner Men in Athens on Saturday.

Boomer Sooner!

[soonerindallas]

Wash, rinse, repeat. Sooners lose by 10. I've seen this movie before & it doesn't end well.

[BudaSooner]

I wasn't able to watch the game, but in looking at the box score, one thing jumped out at me: Free Throws, Georgia 27-37.
OU went to the line 9 times, hitting 7 of them. TWENTY point differential at the charity stripe!
Was OU fouling that much, or was Georgia enjoying some home cooking from the officials? I see that Moore fouled out, 3 other OU players with 4 fouls. Georgia had only two players with as many as 3 fouls, one with 4 and one with 3.

I was surprised to see that OU controlled their turnover rate, only committing 12 compared to 13 for Georgia.
But our 3s wouldn't fall apparently, and that, along with the free throw disparity, told the whole story...

Looks like it's gonna be a long season in the SEC. Porter needs to get some BIG BOYS, we are getting killed on the boards.

[OUBeliever56A]

The Oklahoma Sooners went down to Georgia, where they did not find the Devil (a shoutout to Charlie Daniels Band) and they did not find any fiddle players either just a trio officials that ended up calling 28 fouls on the Sooners leading to 27 of 37 free shots for Georgia and only 16 fouls called on Georiga leading to 7 of 9 free throws. When a team has a deficit of 20 made free throws in a game it is nearly impossible to win. I only saw the 2nd half of play yesterday, and it seemd like it was almost a foul shot per possession for Georgia. The final score was 72-62.

The Sooners did lead the game 36-33 at the half. In the first half, the Sooners overcame a deficit of 10 of 13 for Georgia from the charity stripe to 2 of 3 for Oklahoma to lead 36-33. The lead was possible due to good shooting by the Sooners and 4 made 3-pointers. The Sooners shot 44.1% from the field and 30.8% from 3-point land in 9 more shots by the Sooners. That overcame the Georgia total of 10 free throws made to OU's 2 made.

If you break down the scoring by 5 minute intervals, here is the 1st half breakdown:

1st Half starts - 20:00
- at 15:00 min * -> 13 - 7 in favor of Georgia.
- at 10:00 min -> 6 - 8 in favor of OU - Score 19-15.
- at 5:00 min* -> 5 - 11 in favor of OU - Score 24-26.
- at 0:00 min -> 9 - 10 in favor of OU - Score 33-36.

It looked like a win was perhaps possible by the Sooners at Georgia. Good shooting even from 3-point and holding their own on the boards 16-19 with Georgia leading that. OU was led by Miles 12 points, Moore with 11 points and Elvis had 9 points on 13 of 22 shooting. Moore, Wague and Northweather had 2 rebounds each. But Fears and Goodine were 1 for 9 from the field. Oklahoma had 9 more shots in the first half due to the Bulldogs going to the line for 13 shots.

But in the second half, instead of winning 3 of the 4, five-minute-intervals, the Sooners lost 3 and tied only 1. Here was the breakdown per 5 minutes in the 2nd half:

2nd half starts -> 20.00
- at 15 min -> 9 - 5 in favor of Georgia - Score 42-41.
- at 10 min -> 9 - 9 tie - Score 51-50.
- at 5 min * -> 10 - 4 in favor of Georgia - Score 61-54
- at 0:00 min -> 11 - 8 in favor of Georgia - Score 72-62.

In the fateful third - 5 minute slice of the 2nd half, Wague scored the only points for the Sooners with 2 buckets inside the pain on a dunk and an alley-oop.

In the second half, Oklahoma shot 31.0% from the field and only 21.3% from 3-point territory with 5 of 6 free throws. Meanwhile, Georgia shot 42% from the field and 25% from 3-point territory with 17 of 24 free shots. They had 5 less shots than OU but the freebies for Georgia made up for that easily.

In the second half the Sooners were led by Wague with 8 points, Moore with 6 points and Elivs with 5 on 6 of 14 shooting . They also were also 5 of 6 from the free throw line. Moore led with 5 rebounds with Miles adding 3. The trio of Fears, Miles and Goodine were 2 of 14 from the field.

The Georgia Bulldogs outshot the Sooners 43% to 38% from the field with 14 less shots for only 3 less buckets made. The Sooner advantage of 26% to 18% from three helped to make up 12 points but that was not enough when you include the 20 free throws made.

Here is the Sooneer staff writers about the Sooners road loss to Georgia:

https://soonersports.com/news/2025/1/11 ... at-georgia

I will not blame the game on the offiicals because at some point a team has to adjust, which it did not seel like OU was able to do. But the poor shooting in the 2nd half by the Sooners was likely the reason they did not win the game despite the free throw's made deficit. OU did give up 16 second chance points and but held their own on points in the paint 34 to 36.

For the Sooners to win, they have to get more than 14 minutes out of Godwin, and more than 2 points by Fears on 1 of 11 shooting.

Georgia's freshman phenom, Newell outplayed Fears by a great deal as Newell scored 15 points and 5 rebounds.

A friend, "RahOkU" who also posts here, made the comment to me that maybe teams have figured out how to stop the Sooner offense over the years. It does seem that when OU cannot pass the ball around the perimeter with success to find open shots, that the offense becomes 1-on-1 dribbling with lower percentage shots. When they get an open "three", they need to make it. Yestrday they did not do that enough at 7 for 27 from the field. If the Sooners do not get a direct play from the high-middle screen or a shot off the penetration by the guard, the offense struggles. But that is about what we see from the Coach Moser offense. Pressure does affect the Sooner offense. Big post players seem to slow down the guards going to the rim also. Playing in pre-season against teams with less dfensive effort or committment and less resistance inside allows the Sooner offense to be executed well. In the SEC, that looks to be a tougher game for the Sooners.

Oklahoma is now 13-3 and 0-3 in the SEC with 14 games to play. Can OU win 7 of the last 15 games in the SEC to post a 7-11 CES record? I would have to say that that seens to be a difficult thing to do with at least 8 ranked teams in those 15 games. But the games will be played. The Sooners and four other teams (Arkansas, LSU, Texas and South Carolina) are 0-3 in the SEC after 3 games.

Up next at home for the Sooners are Texas and South Carolina on Wednesday and Saturday next week.

Boomer Sooner!

[AverageJoe]

Wow. That is a lot of typing. Impressive analysis. I’ll just put 0-3.