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Same Record, Different Spin
Published: 12/2/2008 1:34 PM
Last Modified: 12/2/2008 1:34 PM

For the second consecutive year, Oklahoma State’s basketball team returned from a faraway tournament with a 1-2 record.
Though the number is the same, the post-tournament vibe is not.
It was an ominous sign last season when OSU followed a victory over LSU with lopsided defeats to Marquette and Illinois in the Maui Classic.
The Cowboys didn’t just lose. They also didn’t put up much of a fight, falling behind by double-digit deficits in the first halves of both defeats.
Gut feeling afterward, especially when coupled with a lopsided All-College loss to Oral Roberts University: Looks like the Cowboys aren’t tough enough to go to the NCAA.
Fast forward to this season.
OSU lost consecutive games to top 10 teams Gonzaga and Michigan State at the Old Spice Classic in Orlando before wrapping up the tournament with a victory over Siena.
James Anderson said he has a “different sense” coming out of Orlando than he did after Maui last season. OSU went toe-to-toe with Gonzaga, which won the Old Spice Tournament,
“We should have had that game and we kind of messed up at the end with careless turnovers and gave them easy buckets and fouls and stuff,” Anderson said.
OSU was trounced by Michigan State. But, said Cowboy coach Travis Ford, “The Michigan State game, it was more about them than it was us.”
Embarrassed by a first-round loss to Maryland, Michigan State took out its frustrations on OSU and, afterward, MSU coach Tom Izzo told Ford it was one of the best games the Spartans have played in a long time.
OSU avoided an 0-3 tournament by staving off a Siena team that upset Vanderbilt in a first-round NCAA Tournament game last season.
OSU players said they actually gained confidence at the Old Spice Classic.
“If we play a complete game,” Byron Eaton said, “We can play with anybody in the country.”



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Tulsa World sports writer Jimmie Tramel is a former class president at Locust Grove High School. He graduated magna cum laude from Northeastern State University with a journalism degree and, while attending college, was sports editor of the Pryor Daily Times. He joined the Tulsa World on Oct. 17, 1989, the same day an earthquake struck the World Series. He is the OSU basketball beat writer and a columnist and feature writer during football season. In 2007, he wrote a book about Oklahoma State football with former Cowboy coach Pat Jones.

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