Heading into today’s game against No. 21 Mississippi State, it was clear what Porter Moser’s Sooners needed to do to make the NCAA Tournament: win three of their last five games. It all started with this matchup against the Bulldogs — an opportunity to snag a crucial win for their tournament hopes and snap a five-game losing streak.

In the first half, the Sooners started strong but ultimately trailed Mississippi State 37-34 at halftime. Jeremiah Fears contributed 15 points and six assists, while Sam Godwin added 9 points and 8 rebounds.

That first-half performance was solid enough for Oklahoma, and they followed it up with a strong start to the second half, leading 69-61 with 9:06 left. This was clearly the best conference game they had put together in weeks, but the lingering question was: could they hold on?

Despite several late-season collapses this year, the Sooners managed to avoid one today — though it came close — as they played what was their best game of the season up to this point, ultimately securing a 93-87 victory and improving to 17-10 (4-10) on the season.

After a 22-point outing against No. 2 Florida, Jeremiah Fears followed up with an even more impressive performance. In the first half, he totaled 15 points and six assists, which was crucial, especially with Jalon Moore quiet during that period. Fears was highly efficient, shooting 5-8 from the field and 4-6 from the free-throw line.

The second half was more of the same for Fears, as he added 12 points and four assists on 2-4 shooting from the field and an outstanding 7-8 from the free-throw line. Notably, he played all 20 minutes of the second half.

Fears finished the game with 27 points, 10 assists, five rebounds, three turnovers, a block, and a steal in 37 minutes of play. He shot 7-12 from the field, 2-5 from beyond the arc, and 11-14 from the free-throw line. This performance undoubtedly stands out as his best of the season.

The Sooners didn’t shoot well from deep in the first half, going 4-13 (30.8%), but they had plenty of open looks they failed to capitalize on. Two of the four made three-pointers came from Kobe Elvis, who was 2-3 from beyond the arc in the first half.

In the second half, the story was entirely different, as the Sooners shot 7-13 (53.8%) from three-point range. They saw five different players hit shots from deep: Brycen Goodine went 2-2, Jalon Moore shot 2-5, and Dayton Forsythe, Kobe Elvis, and Jeremiah Fears each contributed one.

All in all, they finished the game shooting 11-26 (42.3%) from beyond the arc. That three-point shooting, paired with Fears’ performance, propelled them to victory over No. 21 Mississippi State.

The late-game execution looked great from Oklahoma until it didn’t. The Bulldogs cut the lead to six with 1:11 left and forced a 10-second violation on the Sooners. Then, a missed free throw by Sam Godwin led to a Mississippi State layup, cutting Oklahoma’s lead to 89-84 with 50 seconds remaining.

After that, Miles hit one free throw, pushing the lead to 90-84, but Mississippi State responded with a three-pointer to make it a three-point game, causing every Oklahoma fan to flash back to last week’s game against LSU.

The main difference that ultimately helped the Sooners hold on was that 1) they had multiple timeouts instead of just one, and 2) they didn’t commit any careless turnovers. Ultimately, Forsythe hit two free throws at the line to ice the game. It got a little close, but they still held on.

It was a quiet first half for Moore on both sides of the ball, as he totaled just three points on a poor 1-7 shooting from the field. Things flipped in the second half, though, as he scored 15 points on an efficient 5-9 shooting to bring his total to 18 points for the day while playing 35 minutes.

Godwin also had a solid performance, but unlike Moore, he was steady throughout the game. Godwin finished with 17 points and 10 rebounds, shooting 7-8 from the field and 3-7 from the free throw line in 27 minutes.

Overall, the Sooners received great contributions from both Godwin and Moore, and both made huge baskets to help secure the significant win.

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