Saturday at the Lloyd Noble Center, the Oklahoma Sooners and the Texas Longhorns faced off in a battle to be the Big 12’s best. The two teams were tied atop the Big 12 standings and looking to take a significant step toward securing a Big 12 regular season title.
Oklahoma came into the game with the best offense in the Big 12 and the second-best scoring offense in the country. Texas boasted the Big 12’s best defense. And ultimately, it was Texas that had the better day.
“Texas played really, really well,” OU head coach Jennie Baranczyk said. “They’re a very good basketball team, and we definitely weren’t (today). We will look in the mirror, me first, and be better.”
Texas’ defense created a frustrating environment for the Sooners and midway through the third quarter the Longhorns took control. Texas held Oklahoma to 27.3% shooting and just 22 points in the second half.
The Sooners will have to get back to the drawing board and figure out what went wrong. There’s a good chance they’ll see Texas again and will need to have better answers for their defense.
“I feel like we just were not ready, especially offensively,” Baranczyk said. “We’re going to go one of two directions right now. … I think we’re going to go in the right direction. But we’ve got choices to make, and we’ve got to be able to choose to respond how we want to respond.”