Oklahoma basketball finding offense in unexpected places

A year ago, Oklahoma basketball lived and died by the performance of its two main stars, Brady Manek and Austin Reaves, in any given game.

What’s different this season is Oklahoma is finding ways to win without having to rely on big games from its two senior leaders.

The 2020-21 edition of Oklahoma basketball is sharing the wealth on the offensive end and complementing that with a collective defensive effort that makes its opponents have to earn the points they get.

The Sooners have four players averaging 10 or more points a game and seven who average at least six points a contest.

The depth and versatility of the Oklahoma roster this season has given Lon Kruger the flexibility of utilizing an eight- and nine-man rotation and interchange lineup pieces without much drop off offensively or defensively.

In the Sooners last five games — four of which were Oklahoma victories, and three coming over teams ranked in the nation’s top 10 — four different players have led the team in scoring.

De’Vion Harmon led OU with 22 points in a win over Kansas and had 18 points in the win over Alabama. Austin Reaves, the Sooners’ leading scorer on the season, had 23 in Oklahoma’s upset of Texas, but missed the next two games because of COVID-19 contact tracing.

Umoja Gibson, a junior transfer from North Texas and a three-point sharpshooter, led Oklahoma with 14 points in a loss at Texas Tech and also contributed 12 points against Alabama in place of the absent Reaves, and poured in 18 on Saturday against Iowa State.

Cal State Northridge transfer Elijah Harkless has been lighting things up for the Sooners on both ends of the court since being inserted in the starting lineup eight games ago at Kansas. The 6-foot, 7-inch junior forward led OU with a 19-point performance against Iowa State and has averaged 12.8 in his last four games along with six steals.

Even sophomore Jalen Hill, who is usually the seventh man in the rotation, has gotten into the act offensively, averaging 8.5 points in the Sooners’ last four games, including 11 in the win over Iowa State.

"“We’ve got a lot of scorers on this team, and it doesn’t require me to put up 20 a night. We’ve got plenty of guys to do that.” —Brady Manek on his newfound role since returning from COVID"

Three different Oklahoma players have scored at least 29 points in a game this season. Reaves had 32 in the Sooners’ second game of the season versus TCU. Manek scored 29 against UT-San Antonio on Dec. 3 and Gibson totaled 29, including eight three-pointers, in a win over West Virginia on Jan. 2.

The Sooners are the only team in the country with three players who have scored at least 29 points in a game this season, and those three point totals represent three of the six players who have done so this season in the Big 12.

Lon Kruger’s team has shown the ability to score in bunches this season. No where was that more apparent than against Iowa State on Saturday. The Sooners had runs of 10-0, 8-0, 10-0 and 11-0 during the game.

Manek had nine points on Saturday, including a three-point shot that put him one away from tying Tim Heskett (215) for fifth place on the OU career list for made three-pointers. He did not contribute a point in the Sooners’ final 11-0 spurt to put the game away against Iowa State, but he had a primary hand in the last eight points of the deciding 11-0 run.

Manek was in the starting lineup for Oklahoma on Saturday for the first time since Jan. 6 against Baylor. He may not be scoring at the same rate he was before he contracted COVID (he averaged 14.3 points through his first nine games, but has averaged  just 7.3 since), but he has made his presence felt in other valuable ways.

On Saturday, for example, Manek’s contribution included a career-high 15 rebounds and a career-high tying four assists.

“I’ve gotten (back) into the swing of things, kind of found my role,” Manek said after Saturday’s win over a pesky Iowa State team. “We’ve got a lot of scorers on this team, and it doesn’t need me to put up 20 a night.

“It needs me to play good defense, guard the ball screen, block out and just set good screens, roll, pop, do whatever. It doesn’t always fall on me to score. We’ve got plenty of guys to do that.”

And because of variety of Sooners who have shown they can do just that, Oklahoma is enjoying one of its best stretches of basketball in a number of seasons.

Now they just have to keep that good mojo going.