It's Fat Tuesday today, and unless you live in New Orleans, it probably means business as usual. Anyways, in the wake of two losses by our basketball teams last night, I thought it would be a good idea to regroup and break down the latest information and reactions from around the country. The headline story though, is that #1 Pittsburgh lost to unranked Providence tonight in men's basketball.
For the sixth time in less than eight weeks, No. 1 tumbled. This time it was Pitt -- again. --ESPN.com Front Page
Pretty amazing. I don't think they included us in that, but I suppose you could since we were the "presumptive" #1 team. Amazing as it sounds, we could move up to #2 again in the new polls on March 2nd with a win over Texas Tech.
Despite the losses, it's still possible for both our women's and men's basketball teams to win regular season conference titles. Our men need to basically win out, and have Kansas lose two of their three remaining games (Mizzou, @Tex Tech, Texas). As much as it may pain some Sooner fans, we may need to be rooting for Texas on March 7th (shudder). Sorry, that left a bad taste in my mouth.
As far as our women's basketball team goes, they have only 1 conference loss, while the next closest is Baylor at 3 conference losses. Baylor would need us to lose out in order to clinch the conference title. If we win one of our 3 remaining games (OSU, Tex Tech, @Texas), we are the regular season conference champions by virtue of our two tiebreaking wins over Baylor.
More information after the jump (continue reading by clicking the link below).
We're going to focus on men's basketball in this collection of notes and tidbits:
- Blake Griffin really, really wanted to play Monday Night. Gaging everyone's reaction from various sports sites, and from the fans in general, it was a good decision to hold him out.
Capel said if it were up to Griffin he would have played against Kansas on Monday night.
"He's getting better, but with head injuries you never know and until he passes the battery of tests to be medically cleared, he won't play," Capel said. "But he was pleading with me all day to play [Monday]." --Andy Katz
- Also, apparently, Bill Self considers the LNC a hostile venue. I'll take it. One of Capel's goals in coming here was to create a great game atmosphere.
Self said he's not sure he's had a team respond in as hostile a venue as well as this crew did, especially since it was so young. --Andy Katz
- We haven't plummeted much in the RPI, sitting at #4 right now. The RPI is weird though; apparently it really values an 8-loss West Virginia team in the top-15.
- I've heard some rumblings that a few people were calling Blake Griffin "soft". Not sure who that was or where they said it, but the guy has taken a lot of cheap shots already this year and come out alright. Like this one:
USC Trojans vs Oklahoma (2008, Dec. 04) (via ilmagoandreabargnani)
- The latest ESPN Bracketology, updated today, still has Oklahoma as a one seed. This seems to be a common theme - many people appear to not be holding these losses against us. They also have Texas as a 6 seed, Kansas as a 4 seed, and Missouri as a 4 seed. Oklahoma State was in the "Next 4 Out" category.
- Dance Card, an interesting site that apparently has a 93% success rate of projecting at large bids to the tournament, has Oklahoma State easily making the field and Texas A&M barely missing it (through the games played on Sunday February 22).
- How important is the coveted one seed? Historically, a 1-seed makes the Final Four 41% of the time. That drops significantly to 23% for 2-seeds and 13% for 3-seeds.
- Remember that Texas Tech game we played in Norman? That was our last victory. Pat Knight probably does, as he thinks Blake Griffin is the terminator. I doubt Blake will go for 40 and 20 again. Hopefully, the Sooners have devised a way to stop Nick Okorie who was annoyingly efficient from the offensive end.
- Speaking of trips down memory lane, remember how clutch Tony Crocker was last year? He had ridiculous shots against West Virginia and Baylor. Let's hope Tony finds that groove again. Here's a sample:
OU v. Baylor, Crocker's 3 and the Foul (via propsizzle)
- One more good memory, this time in a Texas Tech vs. OU game. No, I'm not referring to the football game this past season. How about this shot from David Godbold?
OU's Godbold hits 3 pointer to beat Texas Tech (via boomerbryan)
Yes, that was from almost half court. And that is all for now. Boomer!