Osun Osunniyi sauntered over to the Colorado student section, a wide smile on his face.
The senior center, after reminding the home crowd, in no uncertain terms, which team had just won, said goodbye in the way for which these St. Bonaventure men’s basketball teams have become noted …
With a gesture that was adopted, after big road wins, by the Courtney Stockard-led Bona teams of years past: “Hat. Coat. Leave,” he shouted, while pretending to don those items and then pointing toward the exit.
Yes, the Bonnies, on the heels of their heart-breaking loss to Saint Louis in the Atlantic 10 Tournament quarterfinals, seemed thrilled, almost rejuvenated, to take down a Power 5 foe on its own court some 1,500 miles from home. Now, they’re eager for their opportunity to do it again.
And that chance comes Sunday (8 o’clock, WPIG-FM, ESPNU-TV), when Bona meets top-seeded Oklahoma in a second-round National Invitation Tournament matchup at the Lloyd Noble Center in Norman — 1,260 miles from home.
“You go on the road in that environment … to be able to get a win and get out of there, it’s really good, it gives us confidence,” Osunniyi said of last Tuesday’s 76-68 victory over the Buffaloes.
“We’re still playing basketball. We love to do that, that’s what our guys love to do. So we get another great task, another great challenge vs. Oklahoma. They’re a really good team, so we’re going down in another crazy environment and we’re just gonna go in there and try to do what we do.”
FOR BONA (21-9), there’s an added boost in playing a P5 road game just five days after winning a similar contest.
But it isn’t one that’s necessarily needed.
These guys, after all, had already beaten Clemson and Marquette this season, and came within a couple of possessions of knocking off UConn without Kyle Lofton. The current core trio has a winning record (4-3) against BCS teams since its sophomore season. Still, Tuesday’s win did reaffirm two things: That it’s good enough, when playing its best, to win these kinds of games and it’s good enough to make a run at an NIT title.
And that’s the mindset it’ll need against an OU group that, despite going 7-11 in Big 12 play, was among the first four out of the NCAA Tournament field, beat then-top 11 teams Texas Tech, Iowa State and Baylor and lost by just one (56-55) to the Red Raiders in a Big 12 Tournament semifinal rematch.
“We have a veteran team who’s played in a lot of big games before, so it’s no different,” coach Mark Schmidt reminded. “You look at, coming off the Saint Louis game, which is a hard game to lose, we come out against Colorado, we get up 10-2. So momentum can be fleeting …
“But in terms of confidence, we’re confident we can compete with anybody. Our guys have shown that, so win or lose the prior game, the guys have confidence that they can play well and they can beat anybody.”
THE SOONERS (19-15) are led by first-year coach Porter Moser, who notably led Loyola-Chicago to the 2018 Final Four, got the Ramblers back to the Big Dance last season and set the foundation for a return trip this year.
Interestingly, both he and Schmidt each worked seven years alongside locally born athletics director Steve Watson, the latter at Bona (from 2007-14) and Moser after Watson moved on to the Loyola job (2014-21).
And in most ways, OU looks the part of a Big 12 team. The Sooners average under 70 points per game, but they do have four double-digit scorers, led by senior guards Umoja Gibson (13 points) and Jordan Goldwire (11 points) and senior forward Tanner Groves (12 points, 6 rebounds). They’re also experienced, have high-major talent and are rugged, especially on the defensive end.
The winner of tomorrow’s game will meet either Virginia or No. 2 North Texas in the NIT Elite 8. If the Cavaliers beat North Texas, Bona would actually host the ACC power with a trip to Madison Square Garden on the line.
“THEY’RE good, we’re playing really good teams,” Schmidt said of the Sooners, who also had two one-possession losses to Kansas. “The NIT is a really good tournament and every night you’re gonna play somebody that if you don’t play your A-game, you’re gonna lose.
“Oklahoma’s no different. They got good size, they got good guard play, they got (6-6 junior Jalen Hill), who’s really multi-dimensional and really hard to guard. You don’t compete in the Big 12 and be the first team out of the NCAA Tournament without (being good). So we have a challenge ahead of us.”
The Sooners DID rank near the bottom of their league in both rebounding and turnovers committed. And though Schmidt emphasized the need to have a better game on the boards than it did against Colorado (it was outrebounded 31-25), he doesn’t necessarily know if those are components his senior-laden, blue-collar squad can exploit.
That, he said, was more the product of the Big 12 being “probably the best conference in the country this year.”
“It’s known for defense, so having a negative assist-to-turnover ratio isn’t a horrible thing in the level of league that they’re playing in,” the 15th-year coach said. “If we’re going to compete, we’re going to have to rebound the ball better. We gotta take care of the ball, and if we can turn them over and get some stuff off of our defense, that would be helpful because they’re a very good half-court defensive team, very physical.”
For Bona, at this stage of the season, with these five guys, the game plan is almost even simpler than that.
“We got a big win on the road against a Pac-12 team,” Osunniyi said. “We’re going back on the road again, so let’s try to do the same thing again.”
