Three takeaways from Oklahoma’s 72-68 win over Missouri in the first round of the NCAA Tournament

Three takeaways from Oklahoma’s 72-68 win over Missouri in the first round of the NCAA Tournament on Saturday night.

The No. 8 seed Oklahoma Sooners will live to fight another day as they knocked off the No. 9 seed Missouri Tigers 72-68 on Saturday night in Indianapolis. Despite not having second-leading scorer De’Vion Harmon, the Sooners had multiple guys step up in a major way to help make the plays necessary down the stretch to pull out the close win.

Leading the way was, of course, senior Austin Reaves who has always been the key piece to Oklahoma winning games in the late moments – as they have done numerous times throughout the year. He had 23 huge points along with six assists.

Brady Manek and Elijah Harkless completed the three-headed monster as the trio stepped massively in the absence of Harmon. The game ball really needs to be cut into thirds for those three guys’ efforts on Saturday night.

The win moves the Sooners into the second round for a date with the goliath that is No. 1 Gonzaga on Monday.

Here are three takeaways from the game: