Oklahoma Basketball: Sooners Shock No. 7 West Virginia With Stunning Comeback

All season long, the men’s Oklahoma basketball team has been in the lead or very close to it halfway through the second half, but in at least seven of the Sooners’ nine losses they haven’t been able to finish out what they started.

On Wednesday night at West Virginia, the young Oklahoma squad was finally able to get over the hump and stay strong to the very end. That resilience paid off with an 89-87 overtime victory over the seventh-ranked Mountaineers, giving the Sooners back-to-back wins in Big 12 action after suffering four consecutive losses to begin conference play.

The return to action of senior guard Jordan Woodard has been the common denominator in the Sooner turnaround in the past two games. Woodard led OU with 20 points, the final two of which came on a lay-up with just four seconds remaining in overtime to secure the victory at WVU Coliseum. Woodard also hit a jump shot with 3.1 seconds remaining in regulation to tie the game at 77.

Just 10 minutes earlier, the game appeared to be headed toward a blowout West Virginia win. The Mountaineers went on a 14-0 run midway through the second half to take a 66-51 lead with just under nine minutes to go. The Sooners responded, however, with an 18-3 run of their own to erase the deficit and get right back in the game

As was the case in Oklahoma’s win over Texas Tech last weekend, Woodard scored 18 of his points in the second half. In his two games back after a four-game absence, the senior Oklahoma floor leader and one of just two returning starters from last season’s Final Four team has averaged 23.5 points, 5.5 rebounds four assists and 3.5 steals.

There is little question that not having Woodard in the lineup was a major factor in Oklahoma’s seven-game losing skid in which the Sooner record went from 6-2 to 6-9 in a matter of a month’s time.

“Our guys fought hard, held their own on the boards and battled the great pressure that West Virginia puts on…Good road win over a very good West Virginia team.” –OU head coach Lon Kruger

“This is a terrific effort,” said OU coach Lon Kruger in his postgame press conference. “Our guys fought hard, held their own on the boards and battled the great pressure that West Virginia puts on.

“Jordan (Woodard) was outstanding all night long, and he got a lot of help from a lot of other people. Good road win over a very good West Virginia team.”

Here are some of the important takeaways from what Sooner fans are hopeful will be a season-changing victory for this young, but talented Oklahoma team.

• West Virginia came into the game with Oklahoma as the nation’s No. 1 team in forcing turnovers, turnover margin and steals. The Mountaineers were averaging a nation-best 24 forced turnovers a game. The Sooners turned the ball over just a dozen times in Wednesday night’s game. In fact, West Virginia committed one more turnover (13) than Oklahoma for the game. OU’s 12 turnovers was the lowest by a West Virginia opponent this season. No Mountaineer opponents had committed fewer than 18 turnovers in a game this season.
• The Sooners had seven steals in the game; West Virginia, the nation’s leader in that department managed just six steals off of OU.
• Freshman Kameron McGusty had 17 points for the Sooners, the fifth straight game in which he has reached double figures in scoring.
• OU sophomore Jamuni McNeace had a career-high 14 points, 12 of those coming in the opening half.
• Freshman guard Kristian Doolittle had a team-high seven rebounds for the Sooners.
• A little less than half of Oklahoma’s points were scored in the paint. The Sooners outscored West Virginia 48-36 in the paint.
• West Virginia is the highest-ranked opponent Oklahoma has defeated on the road since 1993, when the Sooners upset No. 6-ranked Kansas 80-77.
• West Virginia suffered its second loss to go along with four wins in Big 12 action and dropped to 15-3 overall.
• Oklahoma is now 8-9 for the season and 2-4 in the Big 12, with a home game against Iowa State coming up on Saturday. The Sooners are 9-4 all-time against West Virginia and are now 3-2 in games played in Morgantown.