OU back to its comfort zone

No Big 12 tournament, no NCAA tournament, not a normal offseason, but maybe things will begin to feel familiar for Oklahoma basketball as the Sooners begin practice Wednesday.

Like every collegiate sport, COVID-19 has changed the game, but basketball was one of the first sports where it really hit home what was about to happen in the nation.

On a Saturday in March, OU’s Austin Reeves is scoring 41 points and leading the Sooners to an epic comeback win at TCU. And that Wednesday, the Oklahoma City Thunder-Utah Jazz is canceled, and we know the story from there.

The NBA just completed its season Sunday evening, showing a bubble atmosphere can work. That won’t be the case for college basketball, but everybody is clearly excited to be back.

“Basketball is kind of their comfort zone,” said head coach Lon Kruger during a Tuesday Zoom call. “When they come to practice every day, when they are around each other, when they are in the gym during all the craziness that’s going around in other areas of their life, in the gym they kind of forget all that and focus on what they love to do.

“They need that, as anyone would need what they’re more comfortable and enjoy doing. Basketball is that out, if you will, for the guys. They look forward to it.”

There are still a lot of unknowns as it comes to the season. Heck, the schedule hasn’t even been released and conference games are still being shuffled.

For the Sooners, the big unknown is regarding the eligibility status of its two transfers, guards Umoja “Mo” Gibson and Elijah Harkless.

Neither is a grad transfer, so the Sooners have asked for waivers for each for immediate eligibility. As those have been granted left and right across the nation, Kruger and crew are still waiting.

“No update as far as a ruling,” Kruger said. “Again, we’ll make application for each as we’ve done. It goes to the hands of the NCAA committee on the eligibility aspect of it. No response at this point. We expect something in the near future. The season is still 6-7 weeks away but it will be approaching more quickly than we might imagine.”

When OU returned for workouts in July, it was reported nobody among the men’s basketball program tested positive for COVID-19. OU is now no longer sending out sport-specific results, but basketball has seen how quickly COVID-19 and contact tracing can change the game.

From missing the chance at a tournament appearance to the craziness around the spring and summer workouts, it could be a mental struggle for everybody. Kruger is confident his guys are in a good position as practice gets going.

“I’m sure it’s impacted some more than others,” Kruger said. “Outwardly, they’ve seemed to responded well to it. Anytime you lose your conference tournament, you lose your NCAA Tournament opportunity, the workouts in April, the workouts in June, July, you lose all of that and you roll with it, you make adjustments for it. On the surface, it seems like our guys have handled it in a great way.

“We talk to them a lot. They seem to be solid footing, feeling good, anxious to get the season started. If there's anyone that’s been affected by it more than what would be very normal and they’ve handled it well, then we’d be surprised. We think everyone’s in great shape, feeling good. They’re disappointed by some things they’ve missed out on.

“We talked early on, the big thing is attitude standpoint is how we respond, how we remain flexible and adjust to whatever comes, and realize it’s not going to be normal, it might not be fair to what the norm would be but you have to move on. The guys have done a good job up to this point.”

Reeves ready for leadership role

If ever there was a year where veteran leadership is really going to shine through and be necessary, it’s this one. Luckily for the Sooners, they have four seniors in Austin Reeves, Brady Manek, Kur Kuath and Alondes Williams.

It doesn’t feel that long ago when Reeves was transferring to OU from Wichita State and waiting his turn. Now? He’s going to be expected to be one of the alpha dogs, on and off the court.

He knows the expectations.

“We've got some young guys on the team,” Reeves said. “And they look for someone to push them and do those kinds of things. I think the guys that we have, the seniors that we have, have done that very well. And we'll continue to do that as coaching staff keeps pushing us to do that.”

Manek not worried about chemistry

Reeves is becoming a leader, but Manek is the only four-year senior to begin his career in Norman. He has basically seen it all, coming in with Trae Young for the 2017 class.

For him, he said he’s not looking for major changes to his game. It’s going to be more about fine tuning everything and continuing becoming a better all-around player.

What football coaches have stressed in recent weeks is how a team’s identity and chemistry really get forged during the offseason and those summer workouts.

Basketball was hit with that, too, with the altered schedule. Chemistry is something Manek doesn’t seem to be worried about. It’s more about the on-court issues that are hard to practice until you reach that moment.

“I think it’s been building (chemistry) over the last few months,” Manek said. “Right now, we’re kinda getting into the flow of different lineups of different people being together. I think chemistry won’t be an issue.

“The issue will be locking into the team goal, whether it’s getting this big stop or needing to score on this play or running this play to get this guy the ball. I don’t think it’ll be a chemistry issue. We all get along. We want everyone else to succeed. I think it’s more of a playmaker perspective than a chemistry perspective.”