OU Sooner W BB'ers Start their Week's Road Trip in Austin @ 7 pm

[OUBeliever56A]

The 1st Place Oklahoma Sooner Women's Basketball Team has a big week on the road this week. The Sooners are 6-1 in the Big 12 and 16-2 overall. They play in Austin tonight against Texas, who is in a Tie with Iowa State with a 5-2 Big 12 record. Texas is 14-6 overall while I-State is 13-4 overall. The Sooners will be in Ames on Saturday to play the Cyclones at 3 PM.

In the rankings, OU is ranked #14 and #12 in the AP and Coaches polls and #43 in the NET. Texas is ranked as the RV#27 and RV#31 in the AP/Coaches and #11 in the NET rankings. I-State is ranked #18 and #15 in the AP/Coaches and #13 in the NET.

[edit] - Tip between the Big 12's top two teams in the standings is set for 7 p.m. on the Longhorn Network with Alex Loeb and Brenda VanLengen on the call. Chris Plank will call the action on the Sooner Radio Network. (KREF 99.3 FM/1400 AM in Norman and KOKC 95.3 FM/1520 AM in OKC).

First things first for the Sooners. The Sooners will play Texas in their new Moody Coliseum for the first time on Wednesday night. Texas has played up and down lately with 3 wins and 2 losses in their last 5 games. OU is on a steak of five wins. Texas relies on the guard play to keep them on top but they have a variety of bigs inside to help. When their bigs play well, they are a better basketball team. Gonzalez, Morris and Harmon are the primary guards and play 90 minutes on average. Holle fills in and plays 22 minutes a game. The Texas guards range from 5'6" to 6'0".

The three primary guards are good players and have quickness. Gonzalez is the most consistent but Harmon is probably the most dangerous if she gets hot. I think that Tot, Llanusa and Robertson match up fairly well against them if Robertson can handle Gonzalez or Holle on defense. If not, Llanusa can handle Gonzalez with her athletic play. Robertson may be able to handle Morris on defense with her smart play. I think Tucker will play for her defense at times and will be important for the Sooners. Joens will get her minutes and matches up with Morris.

Inside, Texas plays four players that range from 6'2" to 6'4". Gaston is probably the best at 6'2". the other three are 6'4". Williams and Vann can match up well with Gaston I believe. L Scott and Culliton/Vann will have to match up with the taller Texas players. Faye is a Texas player to watch on the offensive boards i think. The Sooners must be mindful of her.

Statistically, the two teams tonight are virtually the same except that OU scores about 10 more points and give up about 10 more points a game. The Sooners average 5 more shot a game and makes almost twice the number of 3's as does Texas. As the game approaches the mid-80's in score it favors the Sooners.

As always, the advantage for the Sooners is to get the ball moving and play with pace. Texas may be able to match that pace with their guards but I do not think their forwards can. If the game is played at a slower pace, the Longhorn bigs will become more of a factor. The Sooners have been taking better care of the basketball lately and that needs to continue tonight. Llanusa and Williams will be important scorers for the Sooners tonight. Liz Scott and Culliton have played well lately and they need to do so tonight also. Robertson has been a support player the last few games as defenses stick to her like glue as soon as she crosses the half court line. Tot has been running the offense and making a few three's when left open. I look for either Tot or Robertson to have a big game tonight. Tucker could add a offensive bonus as well. Texas might play off to help on defense tonight. If Tucker can score 6-8 points, it will help greatly. The way fouls are called will affect the game as it always does. I would like to see the players play and the needed fouls be called but not the ticky-tacky fouls called so much. OU does need to be mindful of those "slapping a the ball fouls" tonight. Just do not do it.

A bit here about Robertson's pursuit of the "THREE Record". She has made 495 in her career. (I think the article by the staff writers is in error about 495 being the record.) She needs 2 buckets from beyond the arc to tie the record of 497. She needs 3 to break the record. I will give her and the team credit for not actually acting like this is going to happen. Robertson is just playing and not forcing anything. I think she can use back-door cuts to score well also. As always, she needs 1 THREE to continue her consecutive games with a 3 streak going.

Texas has not lost in Moody in the conference. In conference play, they win by 12 or more or they lose by 4 (OSU and Tech) on the road. I think Oklahoma has their best chance to win tonight in Austin this week. But I do think the Sooners can win in Austin and in Ames this week.

Here is the staff writers article about tonight's game with Texas.

https://soonersports.com/news/2023/1/24 ... -in-austin

Much good luck to the Sooners tonight in Austin.

Boomer Sooner!

[White River]

Sooners trailed by 4 at the half 40-36. The 3rd Qtr was an offensive disaster for the Sooners. Texas leads 61-42 after 3.

[SwampSooner]

UT 78 - OU 58

[OUBeliever56A]

The Oklahoma Sooners opened very slow last night in the 1st quarter in Austin against the Longhorns. But they managed a fairly impressive comeback in the 1st quarter. With the score 14-4 after the Sooners had 5 turnovers, I believe, Robertson hit a THREE to make the score 14-7. Texas countered with a single free throw and then a bucket to make it 17-7. Texas was 8 for 8 from the field at that point. Robertson made another THREE to make it 17-10. This THREE was the tying 3-pointer for Robertson with Mitchell at 497 for their career.

Kiersten Johnson then pulled down an offensive rebound and made a bucket to make it 12-17. Skylar Vann then picked up an old-fashioned 3-point play to make it 17-19. At the buzzer, Kennedy Tucker made a THREE to tie the score at 20-20 as the 1st quarter ended. The Sooners saved themselves from a very poor start.

The second quarter was played pretty well by both teams. But OU was stull playing from behind. Trailing by five points at 33-28, Tot made a three and Taylor Robertson tied it at 33-33 on a layup. From that point in the second period, Texas outscored Oklahoma 7 to 3 to lead by four points at 40-36 at the half.

In the 3rd quarter, Llanusa made a bucket to make the score 43-38 to bring OU to within five after a 3-point play by Texas to start the quarter. Gaston made one for Texas that was countered by Williams for OU to make the score 45-40. Then, the floor caved in for the Sooners. two turnovers lead to two buckets by Texas to make it 49-40. A Texas 3-pointer made it 52-40. After a Sooner timeout, it got worse. Texas scored on a put-back offensive rebound before Vann made two free throws to make the score 54-42 with about 2 minutes left. Texas outscored OU 5-0 in the last minutes of the 3Q to lead 61-42. Essentially the game was over at that point.

OU scored a woeful 6 points in the 3Q on 1 of 17 shooting (5.9%) and had 8 turnovers in the quarter. Maybe that is called shooting yourself in both feet with two different guns. (If that is not a proper thing to say, I apologize to everyone. It was all I could think of to describe the quarter.)

The game ended with a 78-58 victory that thrilled the big crowd in Austin's new Moody Coliseum. Coach Baranczyk was pretty despondent in the post game interview with Chris Plank who was doing the play-by-play on radio. Yeah, no LHN for me. Plank tied to find a silver lining, (OU out-rebounded the Horns.) but Coach Baranczyk did not buy much of that. She seemed mystified about the result and the 3rd quarter.

It is hard to understand the start in the 1Q and then the play in the 3Q. Listening on the radio, it sounded like OU really worked on getting the ball inside on offense. OU was still outscored in the paint by 10, though. The bigs for Texas (Gaston and Jones) really played well with 35 points between them. In my pre-game thoughts, I noted that the Texas guards is the thing that keeps the Longhorns good but when their bigs play well, they are very good. The bigs did play well and Texas did play well. It also sounded like that OU ran their zone quite a bit on defense. Texas made a lot of shots from the free throw elbow areas and about 10 feet out on the baseline by the radio description. That is where the holes in the OU zone are usually. I was probably wrong in my thought the Sooners could maybe matchup with Texas in their woman-to-woman defense. It does not sound like the zone worked either.

Here is the staff writers article about the loss to Texas.

https://soonersports.com/news/2023/1/25 ... -in-austin

I guess the best thing is to 'flush' the loss to Texas. But it is hard to understand the loss to Utah by a bunch and the loss to Texas by 20 and it was not that close probably. The Sooners probably arrived back in Norman around 3 AM this morning. It will be a short Thursday for them and then a quick practice on Friday and probably off to Ames, IA on Friday afternoon. Maybe, they will fly to Ames on Saturday morning before the 3 PM game.

I will say that I thought it was odd that Plank commented that he was off to Austin as his radio show signed off at noon. I think he was on the bus with the team. To leave at 12:15 or 12:30 to make the 5 1/2 hour drive to Austin is cutting it very close for the 7 PM tip off. Maybe I am wrong about that, but if that is right, I wonder why. Surely OU can afford to go earlier and let the players get settled and have a break before the game. i know they did the same sort of thing when they went to Lubbock though. It just seems rushed to me. But then I am early to almost everything. I am in line for softball 2 hours before the gates open. Maybe I am just off about the subject.

The bad thing about the loss, besides the loss, is that the Sooners NET ranking may fall due to the lopsided loss. They really need to be aware of this as it will affect their seeding in postseason. It probably already is.

Elsewhere in the Big 12 last night, Iowa State beat TCU in Ft. Worth by 40 points and Oklahoma State beat Kansas State by 8 in Stillwater.

Iowa State, Texas and Oklahoma are now tied for first place in the Big 12 with a 6-2 record. As noted above, Oklahoma will travel to Iowa State to play on Saturday in another big Big 12 game. At least I-State is making a long trip home from Ft. Worth to somewhat equalize travel concerns before Saturday.

"turn the page" as Bob Seeger sang back in the mid 70's. That is about al I have after the last 36 hours of Oklahoma sooner basketball in central Texas.

But is it still, Boomer Sooner!

[TN Sooner]

I don’t think they are busing to games very often and they definitely flew to Austin - here’s a pic getting off a plane. Same day travel is a bit surprising tho.



Another tweet had them “arriving” at the new arena in Austin - it was only 1 hour before tip-off, which doesn’t seem enough time for TRob and probably others to get their pre-game on.

[OUBeliever56A]

Thanks for your post. I like that they are not busing.