Oklahoma's Thriller vs. ISU Sets Tone for Heavyweight Kansas Showdown Monday

By the time the Oklahoma Sooners really figured it out, Buddy Hield was finishing Saturday's game off at the site of one of his specialties—the free-throw line.

A fantastic second-half rally earned an exhale, as Hield sealed a monumental 87-83 win over Iowa State in Norman.

The two charity chances came in the closing seconds after a teammate delivered the heavily guarded Sooners star an inbounds pass from the baseline on a seemingly impossible angle.

All Oklahoma was trying to do was secure the lead, set up Hield and escape with a Big 12 Conference-opener win against Iowa State at home. It wasn't the first time a victory like this happened. But this was a special one.

And now the Sooners really need to be feared after surviving a close conference tilt, despite Iowa State leading most of the way.

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“Looking forward to Monday night,” always understated Sooners coach Lon Kruger said of the showdown at, presumably, new No. 1 Kansas, per the postgame ESPN interview. 

"We’ll anticipate it, too."

Kruger knows Allen Fieldhouse quite well, having once been a playing-days legend at Kansas State (after growing up between Lawrence and Manhattan) where he also coached against the Jayhawks. The ESPN-televised Big Monday matchup will likely serve as a rare No. 1 vs. No. 2 storyline at this point in the season: a Big 12 showcase in what should be a special year for the league as a whole. 

And the Sooners can really let ‘er rip on the road.

It’s “just” one game after feeling emotionally like they played at least two against Iowa State. “We were all searching a little bit,” Kruger said of a rugged first half.

Searching—that’s the somewhat underrated theme of these new surroundings after years in the shadows of the league, not to mention a sterling on-site football program.

But these have to be considered spectacular times in Norman.

Sooners head football coach Bob Stoops has lost his knack for winning big games, including the Dec. 31 College Football Playoff semifinal meltdown against Clemson.

That leaves Kruger to take OU to new heights with a program that hasn’t experienced days like this very often in recent years. And that’s why local media were tweeting before the game about how they hadn’t seen various upper-level seats filled to such capacity in years:

It’s why Lloyd Noble Center rocked from the opening tipoff, perhaps for the first time since alumnus/rock star Toby Keith—a member of the 1980 Oklahoma football team—rocked out there in his country music heyday.

Sooners fans had to figure their red Solo Cups were mostly empty for a good part of the night.

The No. 11 Cyclones led 41-37 at halftime and were up 68-62 with 10 minutes, 47 seconds left. They were up by a score of 73-68 before Oklahoma secured a 13-4 run to lead 81-77 with 4:19 to go.

OU finally showed all it had.

Ryan Spangler banged up his knee and left before the late rally that included some key glue-guy work. Isaiah Cousins looked frazzled, missing his first eight shots, before scoring all 15 of his points in the second half.

For ISU, Georges Niang made a push as the Big 12’s (and thus the country’s) best player before he and his teammates succumbed late to clanked shots and turnovers.

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Hield went into his own kind of fade. The senior had a team-high 22 points but went more than 10 minutes in the second half without scoring. Yet his layup gave the Sooners a four-point lead with 3:11 left.

Hield played early like a guy with a green light who could have used a cautionary yellow once in a while.

The Sooners looked hurried and nervous—not sure how to funnel their emotions.

Not to mention their expectations.

Michigan State's loss at Iowa this week will allow for the Jayhawks-Sooners rankings bump leading up to Monday's tipoff, after the Sooners followed Kansas' throttling of Baylor earlier in the day.

Really, it’s not wholly unreasonable to say the Sooners should be No. 1. They’re ranked No. 3 by KenPom.com’s algorithms, but they also happen to own a neutral-court (Hawaii) win against Villanova.

Kansas' only real high-profile matchup before Saturday saw the Jayhawks fall to Michigan State.

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Of course, these aren’t those same Jayhawks from mid-November. They defend better, and they’re faster than they’ve been in years at getting up and down the floor. A veteran team appears secure in its own skin, ready to chase a 12th consecutive Big 12 regular-season title. And KU looks like it has room to grow.

But so do the Sooners, especially in terms of the psychological aspect of the game. Say what you will about how good they are in being undefeated to this point (12-0, 1-0)—or how good they could be.

They had yet to prove this level to their fans, or themselves, until rallying against a similarly talented and experienced ISU.

Oklahoma has finished second in the Big 12 the past two years, but that always felt like major progress as Kruger has continually elevated the program’s standing since taking over in 2011. Second fiddle, however, could actually feel like a disappointment this year—not quite like it would for the Jayhawks. But still, OU’s counting on a big season.

That’s saying something in a Big 12 that is loaded.

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There’s no doubt about it. ISU could have gained a major upper hand with a road win at Lloyd Noble Center. Similar chances will be hard to come by away from home in top Big 12 games.

OU had the toughest chore of all in the early stages of conference play—holding home court against a terrific, experienced opponent—and proving to itself and a tempted fanbase that this could be the year. It started by making just three of 16 first-half three-point attempts—after making a nation’s-best 46.2 percent in nonconference play.

In some special cases, the toughest wins are the big games at home.

Now the Sooners can play it as cool as Kruger coaches and attack with the confidence that they can win anywhere and deserve the biggest of stages. Even in the "Phog."