Oklahoma basketball: Sooners’ season could be at end, but for good reason
By Chip Rouse
Just days ago the talk surrounding the men’s Oklahoma basketball season was had the Sooners done enough to make it into this year’s NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship.
In the last 24 hours, bigger questions and concerns have been raised about if there will even be an NCAA Tournament this season.
Earlier this week the NCAA announced it would hold March Madness in empty arenas without fans. That was followed on Wednesday with the Big 12 announcing that its conference championship tournament, beginning with the quarterfinal round on Thursday, would also be held without the general public in attendance.
On Thursday morning, the Big 12 and all of the major conferences made the decision to cancel their conference tournaments because of the rapidly evolving situation with the dangerous spread of the coronavirus. Players from Texas and Texas Tech were on the floor warming up for their scheduled tournament game on Thursday when, after about 10 minutes, they were asked to leave the floor, according to ESPN sideline reporter Holly Rowe.
Oklahoma Sooners Basketball
Oklahoma, the No. 3 seed in the Big 12 Tournament, was scheduled to face No. 6 West Virginia in the final game of the quarterfinal round on Thursday night.
With the NBA and practically every major spectator sport suspending operations indefinitely in an effort to curb the spread of the deadly coronavirus, which has reached global pandemic conditions according to U.S. and world health authorities, it is reasonable to expect that the NCAA will take the next step to cancel this season’s NCAA Basketball Tournament.
As a result, we could be looking at the end of the Oklahoma basketball season for 2019-20. If this does in fact come to pass, it is for a very good reason. The Big 12 and other major and college sports leagues have punched the right button on the decision to suspend all operations. The health of not only the student athletes but also their fans from exposure to this major health threat needs to be of paramount concern.
The college basketball season is at its most exciting time of the year, with the conference tournaments ongoing and one week away from the biggest event in the college season. All of a sudden, that seems of just minor importance in the wake of the growing domestic coronavirus threat.
With all of the major professional sports organizations shutting down their operations for the time being, it’s difficult to imagine that the NCAA, the governing body of major collegiate sports, would not follow suit.
It should also be noted that while the effects of this unprecedented nationwide decision immediately affects championship week in college basketball, the Big 12 is also suspending its conference championships in the other spring sports.
We should underscore the point that the NCAA has not a yet made a definitive decision on whether the Men’s Basketball Championship will be played. From where we sit, however, the Sooners’ basketball season — both men and women — has likely heard its last final buzzer for 2020.
Whatever the immediate future holds, we cannot overlook the achievement of this year’s OU men’s basketball team.
Picked to finish eighth in the Big 12 in the preseason poll by the league’s coaches, the Sooners battled and willed their way to a 19-12 overall record and a third-place finish in the conference, factoring in the Big 12 tiebreaking rules.
Everything about that screams exceeding expectations. Hard to ask for anything more.