If you thought that Oklahoma's basketball team had troubles heading into Wednesday night's game against Arkansas then perhaps you should consider the woes of the Razorbacks. They are 4-20 over their last 24 games and their 67-47 loss to the Sooners was their fourth consecutive defeat. However, early on it was the Sooners who were struggling by getting out hustled, out rebounded and out scored. That was until the 3:37 mark of the first half when someone somewhere somehow turned on a switch causing three point shots to fall.
Trailing 22-14 Tommy Mason-Griffin hit a three point that would be the first of six made by the Sooners over the last three-and-a-half minutes allowing OU to end on a 20-6 run. Oklahoma carried that momentum into the second half by starting with a 5-1 run and outscoring the Hogs by 13 points to complete the rout. With Oklahoma struggling to get points from the big men it was the guards who took over the game by scoring 57 of the team's 67 points.
Willie Warren was 4-4 from the floor but struggled from the charity stripe going 5-11. Tommy Mason-Griffin was 3-4 from three-point range and Cade Davis was 3-5 but it was Tony Crocker playing the role of the unlikely hero. Crocker scored a game high 16 points while also grabbing 16 boards to record his first career double-double as a Sooner. In the much anticipated debut of Crocker's senior leadership it couldn't have come at a better time and he couldn't have been a better example of hustle to his young teammates.
Just as important as Crocker's 16 and 16 was the defensive effort put forth by Cade Davis who scored 11 points as well. Arkansas guard Rotnei Clarke is going to have nightmares of Davis shadowing and stalking him for a while. Clarke entered the game scoring 26.7 points per game and shooting 57.4% from three-point range. He left Lloyd Noble 5-13 from the floor and 1-6 from beyond the arch thanks to a stellar defensive outing by Davis.
I wouldn't classify this as a complete game performance because the Sooners really struggled for the first 15 minutes but after they got things cranking it was a thing of beauty.
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