On Thursday night at Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, the Oklahoma Sooners will go up against a fourth straight opponent it is meeting for the second time this season.
The 14th-seeded Sooners advanced to the second round of the SEC Men's Basketball Tournament following a win over 11 seed Georgia on Wednesday. OU and 6 seed Kentucky will tip it off in the final of four tournament games on Thursday.
Kentucky is the fourth straight team Oklahoma is playing that beat the Sooners in an earlier game this season. The Sooners are 3-0 in the last three games with a 96-84 win over then-No. 15 Missouri, 76-72 over Texas and 81-75 against Georgia to equal the season series against all three teams.
Will the magic continue in the SEC tournament rematch with Kentucky? The Wildcats squeaked out an 83-82 win over Oklahoma on Feb. 26 behind a career-high 28-point performance by former Sooner Otega Oweh.
Oweh, who played two seasons at OU before transferring to Kentucky after his sophomore season, made a difficult layup with six seconds remaining to overcome a one-point Sooner lead.
The former Sooner scored Kentucky's final 18 points in the earlier game, and will certainly have the attention of the Oklahoma defense in the rematch on Thursday.
Here's what the tale of the tape looks like as Oklahoma goes up against one of college basketball's Blue Bloods for the right to match up against 3 seed Alabama in Friday's quarterfinal round.
From a statistical standpoint, Kentucky has the better conference record, is the higher scoring team and has a rebounding advantage, while Oklahoma owns a better free-throw percentage and has a slight advantage in managing the turnover battle.
The outcome of this game ultimately will boil down to the players on the court and which team is able to make the most of its scoring opportunities and, conversely, take scoring opportunities away on the defensive end. A pretty simple formula but difficult to pull off in a conference as deep and talented as the SEC this season.
Oklahoma is probably off the bubble and into the NCAA Tournament by virtue of its opening round upset of Georgia, but OU can't fall into that mindset if it is going to beat a good Kentucky team.
The Sooners need to attack Kentucky as if their postseason hopes depend on coming away with the win. If they play with the same effort, consistency and resiliency they did in beating Georgia -- incidentally, the Bulldogs beat Kentucky 82-69 this season -- they have a solid chance of springing a second consecutive upset, ringing up another second-time-around victory and, more importantly, improving their NCAA Tournament positioning even further.