Completed Event: Men's Basketball versus Auburn on February 24, 2026 , Win , 91, to, 79
Final
Men's Basketball
91
vs Auburn
79
University of Oklahoma Athletics
OU Opens Hoops Season Thursday
November 07, 2007 | Men's Basketball
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NORMAN, Okla. -- The Oklahoma men's basketball team begins the 2007-08 regular season Nov. 8-9 in the 2K Sports College Hoops Classic benefitting Coaches vs. Cancer as one of the event's four regional hosts. Thursday's first round at Lloyd Noble Center will see Denver take on East Central (Okla.) at 4:30 p.m. and the Sooners meet San Francisco at 7 p.m.
The OU/San Francisco contest will air on the Sooner Radio Network (flagship KOKC AM-1520 in Oklahoma City) with Bob Barry Sr. and Mike Houck announcing. The game will not be televised.
Thursday's losers will meet Friday at 4:30 p.m. while Thursday's winners will play Friday at 7.
If OU wins its two regional games, it will travel to New York City for Nov. 15 and 16 championship round games inside Madison Square Garden. Other regional hosts (and potential opponents in New York) include Memphis (ranked No. 3 in the preseason AP poll), Kentucky (No. 20) and Connecticut. The New York games will be televised by ESPN2.
TICKET INFORMATION
• Tickets for the 2K Sports College Hoops Classic in Norman are available for $10 and $20 (per day). The $10 seats are located in the upper north and south sections of Lloyd Noble Center. The $20 seats are located in the upper east and west, and lower north and south sections.
• Tickets may be purchased at the OU Athletics Ticket Office (800-456-4668). Lloyd Noble Center ticket windows will open at 3:30 p.m. on both Thursday and Friday.
• OU students may purchase tickets at the door (west entrance) for $5 each day.
"NOTE" WORTHY
• Oklahoma's season opener Thursday against San Francisco will mark the earliest ever (Nov. 8) by a Big 12 Conference team.
• Oklahoma has won 20 of its last 22 season openers and 27 of its last 28 home openers.
• The Sooners return 61 percent of their scoring, 70 percent of their rebounding and 66 percent of their assists from last year. They bring back four players who started at least 22 games each.
• OU has recorded 26 consecutive winning seasons, more than any other Big 12 program. Kansas ranks second (24) and Oklahoma State ranks third (19).
• Oklahoma held opponents to 59.6 points a game last year, the lowest figure since the 1977-78 season (a span of 29 years).
• The Sooners have won 98 of their last 109 games inside Lloyd Noble Center.
• San Francisco won NCAA titles in 1955 and 1956, and advanced to the 1957 Final Four.
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OKLAHOMA UPDATE
The Sooners, who finished 16-15 last year and tied for seventh place with a 6-10 Big 12 Conference record, won their two exhibition games last week by an average of 38.0 points. They defeated Division II opponents Rockhurst University (93-58 on Wednesday) and Fayetteville State University (91-50 on Friday). OU shot a combined .566 from the field, .469 (23-for-49) from 3-point range and .767 from the free throw line. It also outrebounded its two foes by a 38.5-22.0 average.
McDonald's High School All-American Blake Griffin averaged team highs of 18.5 points and 9.5 rebounds in 22.5 minutes a game last week. The freshman forward shot .810 from the floor (17-for-21) with 10 of his 17 field goals coming on dunks. Griffin added four assists, three blocks and three steals. He posted a double-double with 18 points and 11 boards against Fayetteville State when he was 9-for-10 from the field.
Sophomore guard Tony Crocker, who missed the team's Labor Day weekend exhibition trip to Canada due to a left leg injury (he sustained traumatic compartment syndrome which required the surgical release of blood on Aug. 28), ranked second on the team by averaging 12.5 points in exhibition play. Crocker shot .615 from the field and was 3-for-6 from beyond the 3-point arc.
Also averaging double figures on the week was freshman guard Cade Davis. Davis came off the bench to score a game-high 19 points in 19 minutes against Fayetteville State with the help of 5-for-8 3-point shooting. He averaged 12.0 points over OU's two outings, was 6-for-10 from beyond the arc and logged a team-high five steals.
Three Sooners -- Keith Clark, Omar Leary and Longar Longar -- averaged 9.0 points per contest in exhibition play. Clark, a sophomore who missed the last 20 games last year after suffering ACL and MCL tears in his right knee, registered 12 points and four rebounds while going 6-for-8 from the free throw line versus Fayetteville State. Leary scored nine points in each outing and averaged a team-high 5.0 assists while knocking down four of his seven 3-point tries (.571). Longar, the team's leading returning scorer (10.4) and rebounder (7.1) from last year, was 6-for-9 from the field last week and displayed improved perimeter shooting. He also averaged 4.0 boards in 18.5 minutes per exhibition contest.
EXHIBITION LEFTOVERS
• OU shot .623 from the field against Rockhurst. Three-and-half minutes into the second half, the Sooners were 24-for-32 from the floor (.750). Last year, OU's regular season shooting high was .585 (against Norfolk State).
• After struggling from the 3-point line last year (it shot .326 on the season), OU went 23-for-49 (.469) from beyond the arc last week. Six Sooners shot at least .500 from long range, with Cade Davis going 6-for-10 and Austin Johnson going 5-for-8. Johnson was 4-for-4 against Rockhurst while Tony Crocker was 3-for-3.
• Oklahoma outrebounded Rockhurst by just eight boards (34-26), but responded to outrebound Fayetteville State by 25 (43-18).
PREVIEWING THE SAN FRANCISCO DONS
San Francisco is coming off a 13-18 season in which it finished tied with St. Mary's for third in the West Coast Conference (8-6 record) behind Gonzaga and Santa Clara. The Dons lost their top three scorers from last season, and four of their top five, as well as their top three rebounders. They return 37 percent of their scoring, 39 percent of their rebounding and 34 percent of their assists.
In its lone exhibition game this year, USF came from behind to beat Sonoma State on Saturday by a 71-66 score. The Dons trailed 29-25 at halftime after shooting .286 from the field in the first 20 minutes, but posted a 46-37 scoring advantage after the break thanks to .516 shooting. Sophomore forward Dior Lowhorn, a transfer from Texas Tech, poured in 28 points on 11-for-21 shooting and pulled down 12 rebounds. (In two games against OU two years ago while at Texas Tech, Lowhorn averaged 4.5 points and 2.5 rebounds in 18.5 minutes per contests.) Junior guard Manny Quezada, the team's leading returning scorer (13.2), rebounder (3.5) and assists man (3.0), netted 27 points against Sonoma State. He was 8-for-13 from the field and 9-for-13 at the free throw line. The rest of the team combined for 16 points.
Jessie Evans is in his fourth year as San Francisco's head coach and owns a 41-49 (.456) record at the school. He owns a 159-129 (.552) career record after also coaching Louisiana-Lafayette for seven seasons. A longtime Arizona assistant coach under Lute Olson, Evans won a national championship in 1997.
OKLAHOMA-SAN FRANCISCO HISTORY
Oklahoma and San Francisco have met on one previous occasion, with the Dons pulling out a 68-61 win on Dec. 15, 1979, in the Golden Gate Classic inside San Francisco's War Memorial Gymnasium.
• OU led 27-22 at halftime but was outscored 46-34 in the second half.
• Guard Raymond Whitley led OU with 21 points while center Al Beal finished with 10 points and 14 rebounds.
• San Francisco guard Billy Reid led the Dons with 21 points.
• The Sooners lost despite shooting .531 from the field and holding the Dons to a .400 figure. Seventeen turnovers plagued OU.
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OPENING STATEMENT
The Sooners have won 20 of their last 22 season-opening games, with the only losses during the span coming to Alabama (68-62 in New York City) in 2002-03 and Massachusetts (84-83 in Norman) ini 1993-94. OU has won 27 of its last 28 home openers.
YOUNG GRIFFIN GETTING PRESEASON NOTORIETY
He has yet to play a regular season college game, but Blake Griffin is attracting plenty of national preseason publicity. The freshman forward is already listed by FOXsports.com senior college basketball writer Jeff Goodman as the country's seventh-best post player and is a member of Goodman's fourth-team All-America squad (five players per team). This week, Rivals.com slotted the 6-10, 243-pounder at No. 6 on its list of top 10 impact freshmen.
Wrote Goodman, "(He's) one of our favorite kids in the country and a guy who's been overlooked when the talk turns to the top frosh. He's strong and versatile -- although the brunt of his damage will be done down low."
DEPTH CHARGE
After the 2006-07 season saw only eight Sooners play regular minutes for the majority of the year, Jeff Capel appears to have the luxury of a deeper bench in 2007-08. In their two exhibition games, the Sooners' top 10 scorers averaged between 16.5 and 22.5 minutes a contest. Eight players averaged at least 6.0 points a game in exhibition play, with six of them averaging 9.0 or more.
EARLY START
The Nov. 8 season opener against San Francisco in the 2K Sports College Hoops Classic will mark the earliest game in school history. In fact, with the 2K Sports Classic second round scheduled for the following day, the Sooners will get two games under their belt earlier in the calendar than they've ever played one. Additionally, the contest will mark the earliest ever played by a Big 12 Conference men's basketball team.
Last year's Nov. 10 OU opener against Norfolk State had been the earliest game played by the Sooners, while Texas (last year) and Kansas (in 2000-01) both started a season on Nov. 9.
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FOUR AND OH, CANADA
The Sooners got an early jump on the 2007-08 season by virtue of their three-day, four-game tour of the Vancouver, B.C., area Sept 1-3. OU posted a 4-0 record, winning at the University of British Columbia (81-62), Simon Fraser (86-57), Trinity Western (107-58) and Douglas College (90-61) by an average of 31.5 points.
Four Sooners averaged double figures in points, paced by true freshman Blake Griffin's 18.8 scoring average (in just 19.8 minutes per game). Senior Longar Longar, (14.5 ppg), freshman Cade Davis (11.3) and sophomore Keith Clark (10.0) also averaged double figures in scoring. Griffin, who is the younger brother of OU junior Taylor Griffin, also averaged a team-high 9.0 rebounds per contest and shot a team-best .609 from the field. Full cumulative stats are on page 5 of these game notes.
A pair of guards who started the majority of OU's games last year did not make the trip. Junior Austin Johnson and sophomore Tony Crocker stayed in Oklahoma due to injuries. Their absence meant more playing time for newcomer guards Davis, Omar Leary and Tony Neysmith. Leary, a junior college All-American, averaged 7.3 points and 3.0 assists while Neysmith, a freshman, contributed 7.0 points and 3.0 assists per outing.
THE MOOSE IS LOOSE
Sophomore forward Keith Clark is back for his sophomore season after torn anterior cruciate and medial collateral ligaments in his right knee on Dec. 28, 2006, against SMU ended his freshman campaign. Clark averaged 3.8 points and 2.3 rebounds in 12.2 minutes a game prior to his injury and, according to head coach Jeff Capel, was starting to come into his own when he got hurt.
The 6-8, 242-pound Oklahoma City product, who was ranked as the nation's No. 57 overall player by Rivals.com his senior year in high school, was cleared for full activity the first week of July and showed no ill-effects from the injury during OU's two exhibition games last week. Clark averaged 9.0 points and 3.5 rebounds in 20.5 minutes per outing against Rockhurst and Fayetteville State.
ALL IN THE FAMILY
For the first time since the 2004-05 school year, brothers Taylor and Blake Griffin are playing on the same competitive team this season. Separated by two years, the pair prepped together under their father (Tommy Griffin) at Oklahoma Christian School during the 2003-04 and 2004-05 seasons and won two state titles together.
Taylor, a junior forward, averaged 6.3 points and 5.2 rebounds a game last year for the Sooners, while Blake, a freshman forward who won four state high school championships at OCS, was a McDonald's All-American last year and is regarded as one of the top collegiate newcomers in the country.
HOME IS WHERE THE "W" IS
Lloyd Noble Center has been overly kind to the Sooners, as they have won 43 of the last 49 games and 98 of the last 109 in the building. OU is 410-69 (.856) in the building since it opened for the 1975-76 campaign. The Sooners have posted home winning streaks of 51 games (1987-90) and 37 games (2001-03). The 37-game streak is a Big 12 Conference record (the league's first year was in 1996-97).
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