Balanced Attack Keys Oklahoma To Road Win Over Texas Tech

A titanic Bedlam matchup in Norman was looming on the horizon, but No. 25 Oklahoma had to take care of business in Lubbock against Texas Tech on Saturday before moving on to the Cowboys.

As the Sooners have done on the road so far this season, they did just that, riding a balanced and efficient offensive attack to a 74-65 win over the Red Raiders.

The Sooners shot 50 percent from the floor and never trailed as they moved to 3-1 in Big 12 road games this season and 5-2 in conference play overall.

Buddy Hield led the balanced attack with 18 points and hit four 3-pointers, two of which stymied Texas Tech rallies and helped keep the Sooners at arm's length ahead of the Red Raiders. Cameron Clark had 17 points on 8-of-12 shooting.

Freshman point guard Jordan Woodard had been all but absent on Wednesday against TCU, scoring just two points and one assist in the Sooners' win. Saturday, Woodard was exceptional, scoring 15 points and dishing out eight assists to go with two steals. Woodard hit three 3-pointers for the game and scored 11 of his points in the first half.

Jaye Crockett and Jordan Tolbert each scored 14 points to lead Texas Tech. The Red Raiders made life difficult for OU on the defensive end, grabbing 12 offensive rebounds and converting them into 14 second-chance points.

Oklahoma led by as many as 14 points in the first half, scoring 10 points off six Tech turnovers. OU finished the game with 14 points off 11 giveaways. However, the Sooners allowed the Red Raiders to close the half on an 8-3 run over the final four minutes of the half to close to within 38-29 at the break.

The Sooners began the second half with the same offensive consistency as the first half. A Hield layup pushed the lead up to 47-34 with 16:04 to go, but that's when the Red Raiders began to make a run.

Texas Tech rolled off an 8-0 run, cutting the lead to five points and forcing OU coach Lon Kruger to call a rare timeout to settle his team down. Hield came out of the timeout and buried a huge 3-pointer to push the lead to eight, but Tech quickly whittled it back down to four.

After a back-and-forth five minutes, the lead was just four points once again, but Hield hit another big 3-pointer and on the next possession, Clark threw down a thunderous dunk off an inbounds pass with just two seconds on the shot clock and was fouled. Clark's free throw pushed the lead to 62-54 with 4:55 remaining.

Tech cut the lead to six one more time, but that was as close as the Red Raiders would get, as the Sooners made 5-of-6 free throws plus a layup in the final 1:20 to finish off the win.

Oklahoma returns home to host Oklahoma State in the first edition of Bedlam at 8 p.m. Monday night.