Finding success against Texas Tech in the past has not been
a problem for Oklahoma State junior guard Markel Brown and that trend
continuing on Wednesday night.
After scoring a team-high 21 points earlier this season
against the Red Raiders, Brown followed up that performance with a team-high 25-point
performance inside the United Spirit Arena leading the No. 17 Cowboys to a
91-67 victory.
“I
was happy with the way we started the game, I thought we started it the right
way,” Oklahoma State head coach Travis Ford said. “We started executing it on
both ends of the court and we were making some shots. How we were making the
shots is what I liked. It was something we worked on, and we needed to get back
to passing the ball. I thought the last couple games we were going one on one
too much, we passed the ball a lot better tonight. “We had the lead like we did
the first half so I was anxious to see how we would start the second half. And
we started it the way we wanted to start it and how we had talked about it so
that was good.”
Oklahoma State (18-5, 8-3 in Big 12 Conference play) had no
trouble finding its groove early with 12 of its first 18 points coming from
behind the arc from Brown.
The Cowboys finished the game 12-for-20 from three-point
range.
Tech was able to rally back with a 10-0 run to cut the
deficit from 26-8 down to a manageable 26-18, but then the Cowboys turned it on
again and never looked back on the way to their sixth-straight conference win,
which put Oklahoma State in a tie for first in the conference.
“It’s
a blessing to be able to come out here and be tied for first,” Brown said. “We
were picked third in this league and now we’re fighting at the top to win the
big 12. We just have to take each game one at a time and hopefully we end up at
the top.”
The Red Raiders (9-13, 2-9) had only two players reach
double-digits as freshmen Dusty Hannahs, finishing the night going 5-for-8 from
the field for 14 points, and Josh Gray, finished 3-for-9 from the field for 10
points, both reached double figures.
Besides Hannahs and Gray’s performances, the rest of the
team could not find their stroke.
““We know what we are capable
of and when an outcome like that occurs it’s really disappointing,” Tech junior
Dejan Kravic, who finished with seven points and eight rebounds, said, “because
we know we let some people down and we know we are better than that, but we
just have to keep working and get ready for the next game.”
The next challenge for the Red Raiders is at West Virginia
on Saturday, the last time these two teams met it ended with the Mountaineers
on top with a 77-61 victory.
This time around though the Red Raiders are looking to snap
a five-game losing streak in league play in their first trip to Morgantown.
“I
believe at the end of the day when it’s all said and done we just have to be a
team in these next eight games that shows improvement,” Walker said, “and that
comes out and plays every single possession, whether good or bad, missed shot,
turnover, no matter what it is, or how mad I get, we just have to be guys that
come out a play hard and compete every single game, right now that is our
challenge not the other team.”