Missouri men’s basketball has faced Oklahoma 143 times over its 70-year history, but Saturday’s matchup will be just the second NCAA Tournament matchup between the former Big 12 rivals.
While the two schools no longer have a mandatory conference clash, they know each other relatively well, given the most recent matchup on Nov. 26, 2019. The Sooners won the matchup in Kansas City, Missouri, 77-66. Seven Sooners and eight Tigers who suited up for the contest are back this season.
Given the returning figures for the Sooners, Missouri coach Cuonzo Martin said he would use last year’s tape to prepare for Saturday.
“I will certainly watch last year’s game film,” Martin said following Selection Sunday. “I mean, you got plenty of time to do it and there’s certain tendencies that coaches and teams have.”
While the rosters look the same as they did last year, both squads are better off than they were last time they faced off.
A surplus of upperclassmen benefitted both schools in the regular season as Missouri and Oklahoma clinched berths to Indianapolis with several AP Top 25 victories and an appearance in the AP Top 10.
However, the honeymoon phase of early February dissipated before season’s end as each team slipped out of the rankings and put up a losing record in their last 10 games.
Senior guard Austin Reaves and senior forward Brady Manek are healthy and ready to go this weekend. Oklahoma coach Lon Kruger dropped a bombshell in media availability this week when he announced sophomore guard and second-leading scorer De’Vion Harmon will not be available this weekend.
“De’Vion has tested positive (for COVID-19), so we’ll be without De’Vion.” Kruger said. “It’s so sad for De’Vion. Just heartbroken that he’s not going to have that opportunity this first weekend.”
Oklahoma will miss Harmon (12.9 points per game) in its starting lineup for the first time since early December and will require a lot more from the senior Reaves, who leads the Sooners in points (17.7 per game), assists (4.7 per game) and rebounds (5.7 per game).
Reaves will draw Missouri redshirt senior guard Dru Smith in the biggest matchup of the game. Both took a similar path to this point, where they are arguably the most important player on their respective teams. Reaves and Smith are all-conference honoree ball handlers who transferred from the Missouri Valley Conference to their current programs and can do it all on the court.
“I feel the comparison is really similar with us,” Reaves said. “We do a lot of the same things and I believe that we really just try to contribute to the team to help us get a win.”
Another matchup to pay attention to is how senior forward Jeremiah Tilmon takes on Manek. OU’s third leading scorer (10.8 points per game) is not afraid to step out deep who has a quick release that put up 17 points in the November 2019 meeting.
“Manek gets his shot up quickly,” Martin said. “When this guy gets off as quick as any guy so you gotta be ready on the catch.”
Tilmon has the size advantage and a better presence around the rim with almost two more rebounds per contest, but the Sooner big man will take his opponent out to the perimeter, where he averages more 3-point attempts (5 per game) than 2-pointers (4.3 per game).
Martin replaced Tilmon with redshirt senior forward Mitchell Smith on occasions when Tilmon has had trouble covering stretch bigs this season.
“As a traditional big, closeouts have to be sound,” Martin said. “You gotta contest the shot and it was such a quick turnaround so it’s not as if you had days to prepare. I thought Jeremiah played better in the second half a year ago, but it was a little too late.”
Martin and the Tigers need to hope that this season does not share the same fate as the Tigers’ last game against OU. Aside from Tilmon and Mitchell Smith, none of these players have made the tournament. The team is happy to be in the tournament, but no one on the team is content with a first round exit.
“Those guys chose to come in doing some downtimes and you don’t take those things for granted because they stayed the course with the bumps in a road,” Martin said. “But you also want to see them guys have success because you know what goes on behind the scenes and the amount of work that is put into it.”
Saturday’s game will tip off at 6:25 CDT on TNT from Lucas Oil Stadium. The Sooners are one-point favorites.
_Edited by Jack Soble | jsoble@themaneater.com_