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Oklahoma State
Road to the Final Four.............................................................................................
No team in America faced more adversity this season than the Cowboys, who finished fifth in the Big 12 with a 10-6 mark. After a surprising 10-point loss at Colorado on Jan. 27, one of the three planes taking the team's traveling party back to Stillwater crashed. Ten people died, including two players. After the conference rescheduled several of Oklahoma State's games to allow the players and coaches time to mourn, the Cowboys understandably struggled and lost three of their next five games. Undaunted, they won four consecutive games from Feb. 21 to 28 before losing their regular-season finale at Oklahoma. Despite the plane crash, the regular season held several highlights. The Cowboys scored a non-conference victory over Arkansas and outlasted Iowa State by 88-80 in a memorable overtime battle. The most dramatic moment, though, came on Feb. 5 against visiting Missouri. It was the team's first game back after the tragic deaths. The emotion in Gallagher-Iba Arena was palpable and Oklahoma State prevailed, 69-66. Player to Watch Where would the Cowboys have finished without junior guard Maurice Baker? In the bottom half of the conference. Baker, a transfer from Dixie College in Utah, finished second in the Big 12 in scoring at 19.7 points per game. Baker isn't merely a scorer, though. He averaged 6.7 rebounds per game, the No.2 mark on the team and No. 17 in the conference. Baker almost single-handedly carried the Cowboys to victory in the regular-season finale against Oklahoma. Baker made 10 of 17 field-goal attempts en route to a game-high 31 points. But his teammates combined to make only 8 of 27 shots and the Cowboys suffered a 68-56 loss to their rivals. "If we wouldn't have had him," Oklahoma State coach Eddie Sutton said of Baker, "we really would have gotten our brains beat out." With the Ball This clearly is a guard-oriented team, led by Baker and sophomore Victor Williams, who averaged 12.0 points per game. Junior forward Fredrik Jonzen, who averaged 14.9 points during the regular season, is the team's most dependable front-court scorer. Opposing teams have learned they can focus on Jonzen, though, and put even more pressure on the team's guards. Oklahoma focused its defensive attack on Jonzen in the teams' rematch and held him to two points and just one assist in 37 minutes. "The guy we felt like we had to take away from them was Jonzen," Oklahoma coach Kelvin Sampson said. Defending the Ball If the Cowboys had been able to generate more consistent offensive production this season they probably would have finished higher in the Big 12 standings. Their defense was sound enough. Oklahoma State held opponents to an average of 64.9 points per game, the No. 2 mark in the Big 12. That was a lower mark than put up by Iowa State, Kansas, Texas and Oklahoma, the four teams that finished ahead of Oklahoma State in the standings. Seed Analysis Exceeding the Seed Playing to Expectations Falling Short BRACKETOLOGY SCORE: 1.095 (1,000 is playing exactly to a team's historical seeding) Bracketology Report1985-2000:Oklahoma State has played its best tournament basketball coming out of the East Region. The Cowboys reached the 1995 Final Four from the East and made the Elite Eight there last year as a No. 3 seed. Overall, Oklahoma State has fallen short of its projected performance only twice (1994, 1992) in the 64-team era, and both of those were by a single game. The Cowboys, like Temple, play a style that is conducive to early-round success. Roster
 NCAA Basketball Championship Week It's March, which means the madness has started and invitations are being reserved throughout Championship Week.  Send this story to a friend | Most sent stories |  |
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