Oklahoma basketball: Standout stats for OU’s game at West Virginia
By Chip Rouse
Oklahoma basketball has already gone on the road three times this season against ranked team and come out victorious.
Two of those three trips away from Lloyd Noble Center were against top-10 opponents (Wichita State and TCU), and on Saturday the Sooners will be attempting to slay a third top-10 team on the road.
The Sooners’ 10-game win streak will be on the line Saturday night in Morgantown, West Virginia, as the Sooners meet up with a West Virginia team that is sporting a13-game win streak of its own. The two teams have combined for 25 total wins this season and gone down to defeat just twice. The Sooners and Mountaineers are both perfect in a pair of Big 12 games apiece, as well.
Something has to give in this showdown of top-10 teams, separated by just one spot in this week’s Associated Press Top 25. Oklahoma holds down the 7th spot, right behind No. 6 West Virginia.
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The OU-West Virginia matchup features a compelling contrast in styles of play. On one hand you have the Sooners, who like to play fast, get out in transition and bury you with the three-point shot and drives to the basket. Oklahoma’s offense is led by the nation’s leading scorer, true freshman Trae Young, who is shooting at a 47-percent clip from the field and averaging almost four treys and 29.4 points a game. As a team, Oklahoma leads the nation in scoring, averaging almost 96 points per game. The Sooners have scored over 80 points in all 13 of their games.
West Virginia has plenty of capable shooters, but likes to put pressure on the ball, force you into turnovers and create offense off of its defense. And the Mountaineers have one of the best on-ball defenders in college basketball in senior guard Jevon Carter, who is also the fourth-leading scorer in the Big 12, averaging 16.6 points a game.
While the Sooners like to light up the scoreboard (reminiscent of 1980s “Billy Ball”), West Virginia prefers to play fast on the defensive end of the floor. And it is working again this season, as the Mountaineers are allowing opponents 64.9 points a game.
Their is a time-worn maxim in college basketball that to be a title contender you must protect your home court at all cost and win as many games as you can on the road.
West Virginia has won all seven of its starts at home this season, and has come out on top in 28 of its last 31 home games. Two of those three home losses over that time, however, have been the last two time Oklahoma visited Morgantown (89-87 in OT last season and 76-62 in 2015-16).
Can the Sooners make it a trifecta at WVU Coliseum?