If the month of December is any example, fans of Oklahoma basketball are in for a long and trying winter.
When was the last time you had Oklahoma and Texas at the very bottom of the Big 12 standings heading into the new year and the most competitive part of the four-to-five month college basketball season? The Sooners may or may not be the bottom feeders in the Big 12 once the league schedule plays out, but the prognosis at this stage doesn’t look all that promising.
Oklahoma stands at 6-4 with one more nonconference game on the schedule before Big 12 play begins. This is the worst start in Lon Kruger’s six seasons as the Sooners’ head coach, but it also arguably is his youngest and most inexperienced Sooner team.
“Our guys know that we’ve got a ways to go,” said Kruger in his postgame comments at Lloyd Noble Center on Saturday after his team had suffered its third straight Saturday loss this month. ”
“We’re getting better each week, and we’re working at it,” he said.
It’s true that the Sooners will likely be a better team in February than they are now, but the problem is, the grade is about to get much steeper and it’s safe to say that all of the Big 12 teams are going to be getting better every week, as well.
Oklahoma has six wins in 10 games. At this same point a year ago, the Sooners were 8-0 and would extend that to 12-0 before going into Big 12 play.
Here are a dozen more notable numbers looking back at Saturday’s overtime loss to Memphis and ahead to the conference season:
1 – Number of wins by Oklahoma in eight total games with Memphis in basketball.
4 – Head coach Lon Kruger used his fourth different starting lineup of 2015-16 in Saturday’s game.
10 – Consecutive wins by the No. 4-ranked Baylor Bears without a hiccup to start the 2016-17 season. The Bears are the Sooners’ opponent in the Big 12 opener for both teams on Dec. 30. Fortunately, the game is in Norman, but I’m not sure that really matters at the moment.
13 – Career-high points by OU reserve Jamuni McNeace against Memphis.
16 – Before the loss to Memphis, Oklahoma had won 16 consecutive games at home against nonconference opponents. That streak was snapped on Saturday.
17 – The Sooners made 17 of their first 22 shots to open the game against Memphis. Over one eight-minute stretch in the first half, Oklahoma made 13 consecutive shots.
18 – Freshman point guard Jordan Shepherd’s 18 points against Memphis doubled his previous season-high nine points against Oral Roberts.
33 – Minutes played by Sooner sophomore Jamuni McNeace in the Memphis game, twice his season average, largely because of foul trouble by Khadeem Lattin.
39 – Combined wins out of 43 games by Oklahoma’s first four Big 12 opponents (Baylor, TCU, Kansas State and Kansas) to start conference play.
40 – Three Oklahoma reserves scored in double digits against Memphis as the Sooner bench outscored the Tiger bench 40-8.
52 – Points in the paint scored by Memphis in the win over the Sooners. The Tigers seemingly were able to get to the rim anytime they wanted against the Sooners.
4,946 – Estimated attendance for Saturday’s game with Memphis at Lloyd Noble Center. That is a slightly more than half of capacity.