Fran Fraschilla may have described this game perfectly; It was like a really good varsity team playing a really good JV team.
The Sooners started the game at a big disadvantage with Jordan Woodard missing his second consecutive game, and the Bears coming out shooting hot beyond the 3-point line. In the first four minutes of play, Baylor knocked down three 3-pointers from three different players. In contrast, Oklahoma started shooting 17 percent from the floor compared to Baylor's 50 percent, and trailed 11-2 at the first media timeout.
A 2-pointer from Christian James and a 3-pointer from Matt Freeman cut the lead to 4, and gave OU a glimmer of hope after a rough start. However, the Bears answered with a 6-0 run of their own, pushing the lead to 17-7.
In a 6:59 stretch, the Sooners failed to score, turned the ball over three times and missed eight straight shots. With a little under eight minutes to play in the first half, OU shot 3-16 from the floor, or 19 percent. They only managed to score seven points with 7:52 to go in the half, and trailed Baylor seven to 21.
Much like most of this season, the ball just seemed to not bounce OU's way throughout the first half. Every tiny scoring spree by the Sooners was answered by an onslaught of Baylor points. Baylor's success started with their leader Johnathan Motley. At half, Motley had 13 points and six rebounds. Khadeem Lattin showed the most fight he has had all season, in the absence of Woodard, but still only accounted for four points and a rebound. The story of the first half came from the points in the paint. The Bears scored 20 points in the paint versus Oklahoma only scoring six. OU finished the half shooting 26 percent from the field compared to Baylor's 52 percent. Lattin was the only player at half for Oklahoma with more than one field goal.
The second half did not get any better. In a little over five minutes into the second half, Baylor went on a 14-7 run. The Sooners could not seem to find any sort of groove in this game, as Baylor just continued to keep their foot on the pedal. The game slowly became unbearable to watch as the lead held by Baylor climbed to 29 points at the 12-minute mark.
Baylor ended up beating the Sooners 76-50. The 26-point margin was the second worst loss by the Sooners to Baylor. The worst loss was back in 2010, when Oklahoma lost by 31 points to the Bears in Waco.
Motley ended with a double-double, scoring 19 points and grabbing 13 rebounds. Manu Lecomte added 14 points with four assists, and Jo Lual-Acuil Jr. scored 12 points with eight rebounds. The three-headed monster was too much for Oklahoma. James finished with 11 points, and Kameron McGusty contributed nine points. Lattin scored eight points with five rebounds, and Freeman followed behind with seven points and four rebounds.
Oklahoma finished the game shooting 33 percent from the field, and got outscored in the paint 38-16. The Bears grabbed 16 more rebounds than the Sooners, as they overpowered Oklahoma under the basket. If this were the NBA, this would be the time that a team would debate tanking the rest of the season to get a good NBA draft pick. However, this does not apply to NCAA, and I don’t think Trae Young would be swayed to come here if the Sooners lost the rest of their games... or would he?
The Sooners next game is against TCU in Fort Worth on Tuesday, January 3rd at 8:00 PM CT.