Monday, March 06, 2006

Longhorns Rout Sooners


It was ugly early and often as the Texas Longhorns, led by Daniel Gibson’s 22 points, pounded the Oklahoma Sooners 72-48 to win a share of the Big 12 Championship.

For the Longhorns it was their most dominant win over the Sooners since 2004 and it ended a three game losing streak to Oklahoma.

For the Sooners it was their worst performance since being run off the court by West Virginia way back in December.

The most frustrating part is that the Sooners didn’t even appear to have attempted the same game plan that allowed them to beat the Longhorns rather handedly in December. OU chose not to push the ball up the floor and instead the Sooner offense game plan was to walk the ball across the timeline and then throw it away.

Oklahoma committed 14 turnovers and shot only 21-50 from the floor including 4-15 from beyond the three point line. Here is the killer for the Sooners. While they did shoot %100 from the free throw line they only attempted two for the game.

I don’t blame the lack of free throws on the officiating. I blame it on the Sooners lack of execution and aggressiveness which pretty much sums up the way OU played all afternoon.

Texas is a good basketball team but the Sooners made them look a lot better. OU played with no heart and raised the white flag of surrender early in the second half.

The Sooners will play next in the conference tournament on Friday against Thursday’s Nebraska/Missouri winner.