Sooner Basketball Notes 2/27: Avoid Rumor Mills

Remember back in elementary school, when you would play "telephone". One person would whisper something to another person, and then that process was repeated another 20 or 30 times. By the time the message had been passed that many times, it was something completely different. Anyways, the point of the game, I think, was to teach you to avoid using second or third hand information if possible. And that brings me to the first note:

• Rumors have been flying about the Sooner basketball team lately on various message boards related to injuries and suspensions. Let's be clear with what has been made official and is known: Ray Willis is out indefinitely on suspension, Kyle Cannon was dismissed from the team, Juan Pattillo received a one game suspension from Capel for violation of team rules. On the injury front, Blake Griffin has a concussion and may or may not play. Austin Johnson has been bothered by back spasms lately. He is a projected starter, but if he plays like he did against KU, then his minutes may be limited. Anything else is a rumor, and without any way of verifying it, you should probably ignore it.
• So basically, we will be without our "sixth man" and perhaps Blake Griffin. No status report, so it's beginning to look like it will be a game time decision. I'm alright with that, as it will give Texas Tech less time to gameplan against us either way.

With all that out of the way, it's time to get to the more interesting stuff. Here are today's interesting nuggets or facts:

• On only one day in February in men's college basketball has there not been an upset (February 20). On every other day this month we've seen an upset. Now I see why they call it the dog days of the college season.
• Say what you want about Blake, but I think Austin Johnson is the pulse of the team. We need him healthy to be successful. In our 3 losses, he shot only 5-22, was 0-9 from 3 point range. In fact when Austin fails to hit a 3 in a game, our games are usually uncomfortably close. It's not his scoring volume, but he is usually clutch. Get better Austin!
• Speaking of AJ, he's 12th nationally in assist/turnover ratio. Impressive.
• Cade Davis' minutes have been on a steady decline all season. It's really unfortunate because he improved his game a lot this season and especially his defense. He's a spark plug.