Graham’s 27 lead No. 6 Kansas past No. 3 Oklahoma 76-72

It’s showdown time in the Big 12. While we probably can’t expect another insane triple-overtime rendezvous, this is still sure to be one of the best games left on the season’s schedule.

Anyway, there was Kansas, without starting guard Frank Mason III for the final 3:18, with the junior’s fifth foul precipitating a massive four-point play from Oklahoma’s Jordan Woodard…and on the next two offensive possessions, the Jayhawks received a pair of stubborn three-pointers from Graham, the first tying the game and the second creating a lead that his team would not relinquish in the final moments.

Instead, Hield connected on just 5-of-15 attempts all game and did not record a single two-point basket.

The Kansas Jayhawks and Oklahoma Sooners meet Saturday at the Lloyd Noble Center. Every contest from this point forward is must win for Oklahoma now with no room for error. The Jayhawks are now 21-4 overall, 9-3 in the league and tied with West Virginia atop the Big 12 standings thanks to Saturday’s 76-72 win at Oklahoma. The Jayhawks have been playing better lately, but they’re still not at the level that I thought they would be at this point in the season (due to their performances in Maui and other early games). Jayhawks and Sooners tickets certainly are not cheap for this showdown, but fans can save some extra cash by finding their parking before they get to the game. OU’s Buddy Hield put up 46 points, but it wasn’t enough to knock off the Jayhawks in Allen Fieldhouse, and Oklahoma fell, 109-106, in triple OT.

The best bet is for Mason, Wayne Selden, Jr, and Devonte’ Graham to deny Hield the ball as much as possible and to never leave the accurate, quick-triggered shooter unattended. “And then in the second half, we got off to a good start and it was a good battle back and forth the rest of the way”.

If Hield continues to shoot 50 percent from the field this season, he will be the first player since 1995-1996 to do so. “So I just cut my phones off. It was something I couldn’t even keep up with”. All 24 of his points came on free throws and three-pointers, with six free throws representing his total output in the first half. “If he’d have gotten 10 more touches, he could have scored 10 more points, easily”. Graham made Hield work for everything he got, and limited the Bahamian senior to 0-for-6 shooting in the game’s first 20 minutes. While Hield did end up scoring 24 points and made some big shots in the second half, Graham helped hold him without a field goal in the entire first half as the primary defender assigned to the Sooners’ star guard.

The Sooners had won 12 straight games to start the season and were undefeated entering conference play for the first time in a generation. The 6-4 guard averages 25.7 points per game and is as good as anyone in the nation. I also think Kansas matches up well with Oklahoma.

In conference play, Kansas has suffered a nine-point loss at West Virginia, a 19-point setback at Oklahoma State and Iowa State beat them by 13 in Ames. Also on hand were Oklahoma City Thunder coach Billy Donovan and former OU and TCU coach Billy Tubbs. Oklahoma F Khadeem Lattin did not score at all against Texas earlier in the week, and Perry Ellis is not the type of defender that you can have a bounce back game on.