Oklahoma State Advances in Big 12 Tournament With 57-49 Win Over OU
Oklahoma State completed the three-game sweep of the Oklahoma Sooners, this time a 57-49 win to advance to the next round of the Big 12 tournament.
It also marked the seventh of the last eighth win over the Sooners, but this one gets the Pokes one step closer to a berth in the NCAA tournament.
With the win, the Cowboys move to 18-14 overall on the season and will face the No. 2 seed Texas in a 6 p.m. CT tip and will be televised on either ESPN or ESPN2.
“[Beating OU] for a third time, and with all this riding on the rivalry of the game itself, and on our season, really proud of our guys for just gutting out a win on a night where we didn’t have our best offensive performance,” Mike Boynton told the Cowboy Radio Network about the win over OU to advance in the Big 12 tournament. “Playing at the level we did for the full game, I thought our guys were locked in on the game plan and making it difficult. I thought Tyreek Smith, again, was a major factor in getting us off to a good start from a physicality standpoint and really, really proud of the whole group.”
It was Caleb Asberry who led the way for the Pokes as he finished with 15 points on 4-of-12 shooting from the field, 3-of-8 from 3-point range and 4-of-4 from the free throw line. He also finished with eight rebounds.
Both Bryce Thompson and John-Michael Wright scored in the double digits with 12 for Thompson on 5-of-12 shooting and 10 for Wright on 4-of-13 shooting.
Tyreek Smith was very solid for the Pokes as finished the game with seven points and 14 rebounds, eight of which came on the defensive end, his highest rebound total since arriving in Stillwater last season. Moussa Cisse also finished with double digit rebounds with 11, seven of which came on the defensive end. He also finished with eight points.
As a team, the Cowboys shot just 35% from the field and just 25% from 3-point range, as well as 62% from the free throw line. They did, however, outrebound the Sooners 49-39, a 35-29 mismatch on the defensive end and 16-10 on the offensive end, with 16 points coming in second chance points.
As for the defensive end of things, the Cowboys held the Sooners to just 25% shooting from the field and 26% from 3-point range.
While it wasn’t the best shooting half of the season for the Cowboys, it was certainly a solid half as they went into the break with a six-point lead, 26-20.
The Cowboys used an 18-1 run during that time to go up 22-8, but the Sooners went on a quick 12-0 run of their own to cut the Pokes’ lead to just two points, 22-20. The Cowboys did, however, hold the Sooners scoreless in the final four minutes of the first half after a layup from John-Michael Wright ended the 12-0 OU run.
As mentioned above, the Cowboys struggled from the field in the first half despite the big run and halftime lead. They shot nearly 39% from the field on 12-of-31 shooting from the field and just 11% from 3-point range on just 1-of-9 shooting.
They did, however, hold the Sooners to their lowest scoring half of the season on the other end of the court. The Cowboys held the Sooners to just 22% shooting from the field on 7-of-32 from the field. They were fairly solid from 3-point range though as they went 4-of-11 to go on their 12-0 run.
Caleb Asberry hit the first bucket of the second half, a high-arching 3-pointer, just the second three of the game for the Pokes, putting the Cowboys up nine, 29-20.
There wouldn’t be too much more scoring over the next 10 minutes as both teams went scoreless for nearly four minutes each with the Cowboys leading just 35-30. By the 10-minute mark, the Cowboys were shooting just 34% from the field and just 20% from 3-point range, while the Sooners were shooting just 24% from the field and 33% from 3-point range.
John-Michael Wright hit another big three to put the Cowboys up by eight, 38-30, just under 10 minutes. However, the Sooners’ Tanner Groves hit an and-one on the other end to negate the bucket by Wright. However, Cisse followed that up with a big dunk on the other end, which was followed by a steal and a fastbreak layup by Wright, putting the Cowboys up by nine, 42-33, just under nine minutes to play.
Five minutes later, Asberry hit his third 3-pointer of the game, all coming in the second half, putting the Cowboys back up by nine, 48-39, with just under six minutes. The next time down the court, Thompson hit another mid-range bucket from the free throw line, giving him 12 points in the game.
While the Sooners finished the game on a 6-0 run, Mike Boynton was able to put his reserves into the game in the final minute as the Cowboys put the game out of reach with a free throw from Moussa Cisse with 41 seconds left in the game.