NORMAN — The second half started with an alley oop from Jeremiah Fears to Sam Godwin. Duke Miles followed that up with a 3-pointer.
Then Brycen Goodine made a 3-pointer.
Fears followed that with a layup.
Jalon Moore and Goodine made back-to-back 3-pointers.
Godwin made a dunk. Fears again made another layup.
By the time Glenn Taylor made a layup, it capped off a 23-0 run for the Sooners to open the second half. The Sooners made nine consecutive shots during that stretch while holding No. 24-ranked Vanderbilt scoreless, flipping a four-point halftime deficit into a 17-point lead.
The offensive simply found a rhythm, the defense tightened up and the Sooners rode that momentum to an 97-67 win over the Commodores Saturday at the Lloyd Noble Center.
"I just think (that was) us playing as a team," Moore said. "Us locking down on defense, being connected on defense, made a couple of adjustments coming out of halftime. Us sharing the ball on the other end, got a lot of guys going."
That second-half run really was a continuation of the way the Sooners ended the first half. With Vanderbilt leading by 11 points with 3:30 before halftime, the Sooners closed the first half on a 9-2 run that was punctuated by a 3-pointer from Luke Northweather with 28 seconds to go.
Combining that with their second-half run, that stretch saw the Sooners outscore Vanderbilt 30-4. That proved to be the run the Sooners needed to find their footing in a game they had to win.
"Credit Dayton (Forsythe), Duke (Miles), those guys that ended the first half to bring that energy so we could bring that energy in the second half," Moore said. "That’s kind of what helped us tonight."
With the win, the Sooners improve to 16-5 on the season and 3-5 in SEC play.
NOTES
— Vanderbilt led by as many as 12 points in the first half and went into half with 42 points on 47% shooting from the floor and 43% shooting from the 3-point line.
But OU's defense was significantly better in the second half. Vanderbilt scored just 27 points after halftime while shooting just 30% from the field.
After trailing 42-38 at halftime, the Sooners outscored Vanderbilt 61-27 in the second half.
— The Sooners were remarkably efficient offensively. They shot 63% from the field (36/57) and 55% from 3 (11/20).
In the second half? The Sooners scored 61 points while shooting a blistering 73% from the field and 58% from the 3-point line.
— It was turnovers that killed Oklahoma in the first half. The Sooners coughed the ball up 11 times, which led to 10 Vanderbilt points.
The Sooners completely flipped that script in the second half. They committed just six turnovers after halftime while scoring 15 points off of 10 second-half turnovers for Vanderbilt.
"I think they had 12 more shots than us at halftime," OU coach Porter Moser said. "We were down four. We just talked about it, we switched our defense, and we talked about taking care of the ball. One of the guards said to me, ‘Hey, their pressure and speed is real.’ They were up there really pressuring you far away from the court. When you’re not aggressive, they can poke at it, and they’re elite at it.
"I thought we were a lot stronger and went downhill more than in the first half. You get more attempts at the rim and we shot it the way we shot it... Taking care of the ball in the second half enabled us to do that.”
— The Sooners won the rebounding battle 39-24, a huge bounce back after they were outrebounded by 28 against Texas A&M.
"We just talked about it (after the game)," Moser said. "It was a big eruption yelled out when I when I told them that stat, that we were plus 15. And they know it. They know it. I mean... to be able to have to rebound. You have to do it every night this league.... So we did a lot of things we wanted to do, especially the last 30 minutes."
— All eyes were going to be on Jeremiah Fears after his dud against Texas A&M, when he was held scoreless while missing all five of his shot attempts.
This was the bounce-back effort the Sooners needed, and it started early. Fears scored seven of the team's first eight points, and that carried through the rest of the game. He finished with a team-high 21 points while shooting an efficient 8-of-12 from the floor, adding six rebounds, four assists and three steals. He finished with a plus-minus of +22.
"It helps us a lot," Moore said. "He starts the pace with our offense, our point guard. When he’s going downhill and getting people touches and getting his own touches and getting to the rim and foul line, helps us and gives us a boost."
When Fears plays like this, the Sooners are a lot tougher to beat.
— Moore who scored 19 points, surpassed 1,000 career points during the game.
— Forsythe continues to be a genuine difference-maker off the bench. In one particular sequence at the end of the first half, Forsythe forced a jump ball defensively, drove and made a layup, then stripped a Vanderbilt player that resulted in a turnover. It was a big reason why Oklahoma ended the half on a 9-2 run.
Forsythe — who finished with 14 points, three rebounds and three steals — wasn't even in the rotation to begin conference play. But he's now logged at least 22 minutes in the last two games and has become an indispensable cog in the Sooners' machine.
He was a big reason why the Sooners held an 32-10 advantage in bench scoring against Vanderbilt.
— Vanderbilt guard Jason Edwards was on a heater to start the game, making four of his first five shots. But the Sooners held him in check, as he made just three of his final 15 shots. He finished the game with 21 points on 7-of-20 shooting.
— This was a significantly important victory for the Sooners, who face No. 1 Auburn (8 p.m. Tuesday, SEC Network) and No. 8 Tennessee next week.
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