Oklahoma appears to have West Virginia’s number this season. The Sooners delivered WVU two of its seven losses and had little trouble breaking the vaunted pressure defense when the teams last met. And OU has this guy named Buddy Hield, who just dropped 39 in a quarterfinal win.
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HOW THE OKLAHOMA SOONERS CAN COVER THE SPREAD
The stakes are high for the third-seeded Sooners, as running the table in the tournament could land them a No. 1 seed for the NCAA Tournament. They’ve won three straight and five of six following consecutive losses to Kansas and Texas Tech in mid-February.
If Buddy Hield has a game close to what he did against Iowa State on Thursday, the Sooners will be in good shape. The Big 12 Player of the Year showed why the honor was bestowed on him by going off for 39 points and OU needed every one in a 79-76 win over the Cyclones.
OU’s current run of success started with a 76-62 win in Morgantown with Hield going for 29 in that game. The Sooners were able to crack the press with exquisite ball-handling and used balanced scoring to knock off the Mountaineers in both regular season meetings.
Oklahoma shot a season low tying 33.3 percent against WVU in the first game, committed 18 turnovers against the hounding defense, and still pulled out a 70-68 victory. The Sooners know they can win even if they play poorly, but they’d rather not.
HOW THE WEST VIRGINIA MOUNTAINEERS CAN COVER THE SPREAD
Second-seeded West Virginia hadn’t won a game in its previous appearances in the Big 12 tournament. The Mountaineers got the monkey off their back with Thursday’s 86-66 rout of TCU.
The Mountaineers aren’t the most prolific shooting team in the Big 12, but they were lights out against the Horned Frogs, connecting on 55.6 percent from the field and went 11 of 24 from deep for their second-most threes of the season.
Accuracy from the field will be a huge step in keeping up with the Sooners, who haven’t been slowed by the WVU’s usually chaotic defensive pressure. The mountaineers have won five straight since losing to Oklahoma last month, when they shot just 33.3 percent overall.
While the Mountaineers are known for their defense and press under coach Bob Huggins, the offense has been a thing of beauty. They average nearly 80 points per game and have two dynamite scorers in Jaysean Paige and Devin Williams. WVU has the firepower to stay with Oklahoma and a few stops along the way gives them an excellent chance of advancing.
ANALYSIS AND ODDS PREDICTION
Just how wacky is the Big 12? Oklahoma beat West Virginia twice during the regular season and is the lower seed in the tournament. That’s how convoluted the best conference in the country is. And trying to pick a winner between closely-matched, top-10 teams isn’t easy. West Virginia lost both regular season meetings to OU, so one could say they’re due for a win. It’s hard to beat a team three times in a season. The Sooners have Hield, the front-runner for the national player of the year, haven’t been fazed by WVU’s pressure defense, and played a horrible game and still won when the teams met on Jan. 16. The Mountaineers would like to keep the score down and contain OU’s three-point shooting. If they are successful, a victory is within their grasp. But OU seems to have West Virginia’s number this season, and another win takes the Sooners to the championship game.
Oklahoma 74, West Virginia 71
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