Oklahoma basketball: Sooners back home for Red River revenge rematch
By Chip Rouse
The case for Texas to win the game
Four of the five Texas starters are scoring in double figures. That balanced offensive contribution is enough to beat any team in the Big 12 on any given day. The Longhorns also play fairly good defense.
Freshman big man Mohamed Bamba leads the Longhorns on offense, scoring 15.2 points a game. His length and height also create plenty of problems for opposing teams at the rim. Bamba leads the Big 12 in rebounding (almost 11 per game) in conference games and blocked shots (4.1).
Junior Kerwin Roach II and Dylan Osetkowski, a 6-foot, 9-inch forward, both average 12.5 points a game. Eric Davis, Jr. and Matt Coleman are also averaging in double digits (11.5 and 10.5, respectively).
The Longhorns aren’t a particularly good three-point-shooting team (they’re shooting just 34 percent from behind the arc) and they are the worst free-throw-shooting team in the conference. They make up for that though by playing aggressive on both ends of the floor.
A win over the Sooners on Saturday would give Texas a sweep of its regular-season series with Oklahoma. That hasn’t happened since the 2011-12 season.
The bottom line
Come on now. You know the losing streak has to end some time. It better come to an end on Saturday, and I believe it will. But it may be short-lived, because the Sooners have to make a quick turn around and head to Kansas on Monday for a revenge rematch with the Jayhawks.
SportsbookReview.com pegs Oklahoma as a 5 1/2-point favorite at home over the Longhorns. I’m a little gun shy after the last few weeks, but I like the home advantage and I believe Trae Young will have a big game playing before the home crowd. Look for Christian James to have another big game, as well. Better defensive intensity will be the deciding factor for the Sooners.
Oklahoma 84, Texas 77