It took a while for the No. 21-ranked Oklahoma men to find their footing, but a 46-point second-half explosion was more than enough to put away a scrappy Georgia Tech bunch and post a 78-61 win Tuesday night at Lloyd Noble Center in the SEC/ACC Challenge.
Georgia Tech (4-4) led by as many as nine points at several intervals in the early stages of the contest. The Sooners never led in the opening 20 minutes, but managed to narrow the Yellow Jacket advantage to four points, 34-30, heading to the locker room at halftime.
After shooting just 32% from the field in the first half, Oklahoma opened up the second half on a 9-0 run, taking its first lead in the game on a 3-pointer by Duke Miles with three minutes gone to go up 37-34. OU extended the lead to five points on a fast-break basket by Jalon Moore, who played two seasons at Georgia Tech before transferring to Oklahoma ahead of the 2023-24 season.
"I don't want to say we played tired in the first half, but it was a grueling stretch," said head coach Porter Moser in his postgame interview.
The Sooners held Georgia Tech to no field goals over a 12-minute stretch from the end of the first half into the second half, which proved to be the difference in the game as Oklahoma improved to 8-0 on the season, including consecutive wins over teams from the Atlantic Coast Conference. OU also defeated Louisville 69-64 to win the championship of the Battle 4 Atlantis last week in the Bahamas.
Oklahoma had four players in double figures. Besides a game-high 18 points from freshman sensation Jeremiah Fears and 15 by Moore, Kobe Elvis had 12 points and Miles contributed 11. In addition to his 15 points, Moore also grabbed a game-high 11 rebounds. On another positive note, Fairfield transfer Brycen Goodine, who has been injured and missed several games to start the season, came off the bench and hit three 3-pointers.
Through nine games in the SEC/ACC Challenge, the power-heavy SEC leads 9-1.
The Sooners are next in action on Saturday at Lloyd Noble Center, hosting Alcorn State out of the Southwestern Athletic Conference. The Braves are 0-8.
1. Sooners fall behind early, but feast late
Oklahoma shot a season-low 32% in the first half against Georgia Tech, which included a couple of four-minute scoring droughts.
"They always talk about that MTE (multi-team event) hangover," Moser said after the game Tuesday night. "That's usually when you take a week off. We didn't have time to have a hangover."
The Sooners shot 44.4% in the second half and outscored the Yellow Jackets 46-27.
2. Oklahoma won this game at the free-throw line
The Sooners made 26 of their 30 free-throw attempts, while Georgia Tech had just 18 free-throw attempts and made 12 of them. Oklahoma leads the SEC with a free-throw percentage of 80%.
3. OU's freshman phenom in another fearless performance
Jeremiah Fears has been Oklahoma's most consistent scoring threat. His 18-point performance against Georgia Tech was his eighth straight game reaching double figures. He is averaging 17 points a game, second best on the team. He probably could have eclipsed 20 points, which he has done three times this season, had he not been in foul trouble against Georgia Tech, drawing two fouls in the first half.