Men's basketball: Sooners go 3-1, take third at Old Spice Classic

The OU men’s basketball team spent the weekend in Orlando, Fla., for the Old Spice Classic, playing three games and taking third place in the tournament.

How the Sooners fared: OU topped UTEP in its first game, 68-61, but the Sooners were thumped in game two by Gonzaga, 72-47, to send them to the losers bracket. There, the Sooners beat West Virginia, 77-70, to take third.

Key stat: The Sooners had five different players score in double figures during the tournament — senior forward Romero Osby, senior guard Steven Pledger, junior forward Amath M’Baye and freshmen guards Je’lon Hornbeak and Isaiah Cousins.

Key performer: Senior forward Romero Osby averaged 12.3 points and seven rebounds in the tournament.

Quick quote: “It was a great weekend for us,” coach Lon Kruger said. “It was a couple of good wins, and you always like that, but even more importantly, I thought we learned a lot, especially from the first two ball games. We played clearly our best today against a very good West Virginia ball club, so we’ll take a lot from this and recognize what we’ve got to continue to work on and hopefully just keep getting better.”

What it means: A 25-point loss at the hands of No. 17 Gonzaga notwithstanding, OU played well during the early season tournament. Most importantly, the Sooners picked up a win against Big 12-foe West Virginia. Although the win won’t count toward OU’s conference record, a solid win against the Mountaineers should bode well for the Sooners confidence when conference play begins in January.

Next up for the Sooners: OU travels to Tulsa to take on Oral Roberts on Wednesday night before returning home Friday for a game against Northwestern State.

Dillon Phillips

Dillon is a former staff member of The Oklahoma Daily who worked as Sports Reporter, Assistant Sports Editor and Sports Editor.