Stormin in Norman
Fansided

Oklahoma basketball: Positives from a heartfelt loss to archrival Longhorns

By Chip Rouse

Oklahoma Sooners forward Jalen Hill (1) tries top get past Texas Longhorns forward Timmy Allen (0) during an NCAA men's college basketball game between the University of Oklahoma and Texas at Lloyd Noble Center in Norman, Okla., Saturday, Dec. 31, 2022. Texas won 70-69.Oklahoma Vs Texas Basketball
Oklahoma Sooners forward Jalen Hill (1) tries top get past Texas Longhorns forward Timmy Allen (0) during an NCAA men's college basketball game between the University of Oklahoma and Texas at Lloyd Noble Center in Norman, Okla., Saturday, Dec. 31, 2022. Texas won 70-69.Oklahoma Vs Texas Basketball /
facebooktwitterreddit

The men’s Oklahoma basketball team did a lot of things right in it’s heartbreaking one-point loss to Texas on Saturday, but the Sooners still came up on the wrong side of the outcome.

Good teams find a way to win, and that’s one way to describe what happened at the Lloyd Noble Center on Saturday. The Sooners played well enough to win and could have won the game, but the top 10-ranked Longhorns made the plays they had to at the end to make the difference in the game and pick up the road win.

OU played a good game against its Red River rivals. It wasn’t perfect by any means, but it was certainly good enough to win had the ball bounced a little differently on a few plays. But there also were some concerns that contributed to the Sooners’ fourth loss of the season.

Ball security was again an issue, as it has been in too many of the games this season. OU committed 15 turnovers, which led to 13 Texas points. The Sooners have committed 12 or more turnovers in 7 of their 13 games this season.

Oklahoma gave up a dozen second-chance points in the game, but 10 of those came in the second half. Another issue in this contest was the bench scoring. The Sooner starting five scored all but five of the team’s 69 points.

That’s the glass half empty side of things. But in all honesty, there were more positives to take away from the game. Here are three of them:

  • The Texas game is the sixth game this season that Grant Sherfield has scored 20 or more points in a game and the fifth time in the last six outings. Sherfield led the Sooners with 22 points against the Longhorns.
  • Rebounds are a big part of the game, and especially so on the offensive glass because those lead to second-chance points. The Sooners grabbled nine offensive rebounds against Texas, their second most in a game this season. Against the Longhorns, that led to 11 points.
  • Jacob Groves, the other half of the Groves brothers duo with brother Tanner, had his second-best game of the season, scoring 17 points, including five-of-nine from three-point range, in 34 minutes of action.
Home/OU Basketball