Coach Stoops urges Sooner Nation to keep the faith with Porter Moser
Tuesday night provided Porter Moser and 11th-ranked Oklahoma (15-4, 3-3) a chance to kick the momentum for their program into overdrive with a game against Texas (14-5, 3-3).
In front of an impressive crowd at the Lloyd Noble Center, the Sooners squandered that chance with a poor performance, falling to the Longhorns, 75-60.
During his postgame press conference, Moser apologized to the fanbase for Oklahoma's first home loss of the season, and expressed his disappointment after how well OU fans showed up for the matchup.
“I’m disappointed,” Moser said. “I’m disappointed because the fans were awesome. I worked my ass off to get people here and that’s on me. We’re thinking about the race here. Obviously, we didn’t play to our standard. You’ve got to give them credit. But, it starts with me. I put that team out there today and I thought that we were ready and we looked tired in the second half.”
The 2023-24 season has been a resurgent one for Oklahoma, as the overall athleticism and chemistry of this group have led to more success than in the two seasons prior, seasons that put Moser in a bit of hot water with a portion of the fan base.
However, last night felt like a bit of a hard reset for Oklahoma, and social media painted a very strong picture for the pressure that this team is facing now that expectations are starting to climb.
A no-show against a bitter rival, and the growing issue that Moser is now 1-9 versus Texas and Oklahoma State, have many people feeling that it's time to close this chapter and move on.
Former Oklahoma head coach Bob Stoops is not one of those people.
On Tuesday evening, while the majority of folks leaving the LNC were headed home to get their torches and pitchforks, Stoops took to Twitter to urge Sooner fans to keep their support for Moser and this team going.
It's been said many times but needs to be reiterated: Bob Stoops is a program guy.
Continued fan support and home crowd environments will only help Oklahoma basketball get back to where it wants to be, and who better to bang the drum on home-field advantage than the man in the white visor? During his time as Oklahoma's head football coach, Stoops maintained a home record of 101-9 (.918), the best of any coach in the Power Five at the time of his retirement.
Despite the disappointing loss, there's no denying that Oklahoma is trending in the right direction after Moser's first two seasons. A 19-16 finish in 2021-22 followed by a 15-17 season in 2022-23 took a lot of wind out of the sails for a fan base that was ecstatic about landing the talented coach out of Loyala-Chicago.
Now, their 15-4 record to this point has the Sooners listed as a No. 5 seed in the latest Bracketology from ESPN.
Oklahoma will have a chance to get back on track this Saturday, as they play host to No. 20 Texas Tech (15-3, 4-1).
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