What Cousins said and ISU Crowd

[152219]

I politely disagree.

The resulting 5 point swing from the technical had a big bearing. Take that 5 points away and it's a 2 point game at the buzzer. Take that 5 points away and when we cut it to 3, we would have actually had a 2 point lead.

Having said that, I think the missed FT's had a bearing too. Thomas missed 4 when we really needed them.

It was ISU's ball so the technical had nothing to do with Niang's 3 point play following the two FTs. Or the 3 pointer to cut it to 12 after that which set the fans into a frenzy.

 

[skyvue]

Anyone who doesn't think the thirty seconds that followed the technical were key to the outcome of the game must have watched a different game than I did.

Should we have been been able to withstand that call and the eight quick points that followed it? Absolutely. No doubt about it. But it wasn't just that the technical and the points revved up the Cyclones and the crowd; it was that, somehow, it put us back on our heels (to put it mildly) and we stayed there. It knocked us off-balance somehow and we never did really recover.

There is no doubt in my mind that if that technical had never occurred, we'd have won the game--and I think we'd have likely won it by 10 points or more. And again, I'm not using it as an excuse -- no way the technical should have impacted us so much. But it did, and that's on us.

The same thing happened in the Creighton game (and I wish I could recall for sure if there was a technical involved then too). We built up our biggest lead, but there was a technical or a couple of quick steals (wish I could recall for sure) and Creighton scored a few -- not so many, really -- quick points, and the momentum swing was 180 degrees. And not just momentum, but our court demeanor, our attitude changed, our confidence seemingly drained in an instant.

I can only compare it to a boxing match in which one fighter is dominating the other and is clearly on his way to a decisive win, if not a knockout, when suddenly the fighter who's on the ropes somehow gets in one good punch. And it's not just that that punch gives him some confidence, but it also staggers the guy who was winning. Makes his legs wobbly and messes with his confidence--turns the fight around with one punch.

That's how both of those games felt to me. The initial surge in the Creighton game was just five points, I think. We still led by 12 or 13 points, if memory serves. But I could see right away that something had changed and that we were in big trouble. I said as much to the friend I was watching the game with. And Saturday felt just the same.

 

[dahldennsull]

That is why I shop lifted in grade school. I felt so bad I told my parents. It turns out my parents agreed with you. That was not an acceptable excuse. I got in trouble, they told all the other parents and I had to work to pay back the store.

narc

 

[thewez]

I know this is sort of in the past but I just wanted to share an interesting piece of info I heard. Buddy was chatting with some students and he was talking about the ISU game. He said that Cousins shouldn't have gotten the technical in his mind.
He said after OU went up 5-0, Cousins started talking and didn't ever stop. According to Buddy language like that is thrown around all the time. Buddy actually said he was the first to say, "Get that s*%# out of here!" after the Spangler block. He tried to tell the official, "You didn't give me a technical".
It was interesting hearing Buddy talk about it. Makes it sound like players are always talking like that.

 

[SoonerBred]

I certainly agree with your second statement and I probably agree with the first, though I believe the technical call was borderline.

Whatever the case, the call against Cousins and M'Baye's inverted hook'em sign had no bearing on us losing either of those games.

The Technical and resulting 5 point swing was like lighting a match on a powder keg. Their crowd and team went out of their mind after that to beat us.