ANAHEIM, Calif. — The mission, the reason Buddy Hield returned for his senior season — the reason we all got to watch a shooting star emerge at the national level — was simple.
“I want to taste the Final Four,” Oklahoma’s senior guard said the other day.
And now, the Final Four is about to get a taste of Buddy — which means college basketball fans might be in for a huge treat.
No. 2 Oklahoma took down No. 1 Oregon 80-68 with a dominant performance that was reminiscent of January, when the Sooners held the No. 1 ranking and were putting on shooting shows seemingly every time they played.
BOX SCORE: Sooners 80, Ducks 68
Oklahoma is much more than Hield, of course. The Sooners are a veteran, talented bunch brimming with confidence. But no one denies, as Oklahoma coach Lon Kruger put it, that “Buddy’s the core.” All year, he’s been at the center of a traveling circus of fun from long range. And apart from that 46-point performance in a triple-overtime loss to Kansas right after the new year, Hield might never have been better than he was Saturday — on the biggest stage so far.
Hield’s 37-point performance was filled with the kind of moves that made him the frontrunner for national player of the year honors and might just translate very well at the next level. The senior guard slashed his way to the hoop and nailed devastating mid-range jumpers. But it was the three-pointers — on the run in transition, stepbacks and fadeaways, and occasionally from very deep — that caused the crowd in the Honda Center to not so much cheer as gasp collectively. One even prompted an NBA all-time great to salute.
Kobe Bryant was in the building again, as he had been on Thursday when Hield scored 17 points. This time, he saw the shooting star and apparently came away impressed. Long after the game had ended, Hield was on the court, clutching the West Region championship trophy tightly and posing for photos with family and friends, when he spied country singer and Oklahoma fan Toby Keith and beckoned him over.
“Hey, my mom loves you,” Hield said. “She wants a picture with you.”
Keith obliged, taking a photo with Hield and his mother, Jackie Swann, and then the singer pulled Hield off to the side for a moment. Late in the game, Hield had drained consecutive three-pointers. The second was a stepback on the left wing, a dagger to Oregon’s hopes of a comeback.
“I looked over at Kobe,” Keith said. “He just put his hand up and saluted.”
Hield’s eyes lit up. He smiled. And later, during a radio interview, he said:
“As soon as I saw Kobe was here, I knew I had to put on a show. Blame it on Kobe.”
Credit a lot of Sooners for Oklahoma’s first trip to the Final Four since 2002, and coach Lon Kruger’s second trip (he took Florida in 1994). Oklahoma has a veteran core — four starters with an unheard of, maybe unprecedented 104 consecutive starts now, and counting. Those guys can play, too. Hield got things started, hitting his first three from three-point range and scoring 11 points in the first five minutes. But guards Jordan Woodard and Isaiah Cousins had personal scoring streaks of nine and eight points, respectively.
Also, and this gets overlooked amid all the circus shots, Oklahoma plays some serious defense. The Sooners held Oregon to 38.9% shooting, and only 4-of-21 from three-point range, and they outrebounded the taller Ducks, too.
But let’s not overthink this. The biggest reason Oklahoma captured the collective imagination of college basketball fans back in January, and why the Sooners have played their way into April, is no secret:
“Buddy makes shots,” Kruger said.
Hield was 8-for-13 from three-point range. In the NCAA tournament, he’s 19-for-40. And it’s a whole lot more than the 3-ball. After flirting a year ago with leaving early for the NBA, in his senior season he has showcased a greatly expanded skill set.
He’s been amazingly consistent — Saturday was the 12th time he scored at least 30 points — despite being the focus every night of every opponent.
“He’s just had so many good games and so many great stretches,” Kruger said. “However many games we’ve played, you can count on one hand the number of average games he’s had, and maybe two that were below average, and that’s really difficult when you’ve got the target on your back every night from the opposition and you still raise your level and respond and make shots. He did that tonight.”
At times against the Ducks, it seemed Hield was playing a different game. Bryant wasn’t the only former NBA player in the building. Hall-of-Famer Mitch Richmond was there, as he had been Thursday, to support both Kruger and Oregon coach Dana Altman, who’d both coached him in college. Afterward, Richmond praised Hield’s poise and confidence, but also his technique. His quick evaluation:
“He’s so on balance,” Richmond said. “Sometimes you see young players fade, but he takes the step back and he goes straight up. He’s just a tremendous shooter. … I think he’s only gonna get better when he gets to the next level. He’s gonna get stronger.”
Richmond stopped himself, then started again.
“I was gonna say his range probably is gonna get a little deeper,” he continued, “but I saw one tonight — he’s already there.”
And now Buddy and the Sooners are headed to Houston, where they’ll meet South Region champion Villanova in a semifinal next Saturday.
“I don’t see why they wouldn’t win the whole thing,” Oregon forward Jordan Bell said.
Afterward, someone asked Altman: Was there anything about Oklahoma that stood out beyond what you’d seen this season from other opponents?
“Buddy,” Altman said, and he laughed — what else could he do?
“The guy gets 37 on you, that’s something,” Altman continued. “… Every time I felt like we were getting ready to do something, he would jump up and make a shot.”
Sometimes, he made NBA all-stars jump up and salute.
NCAA TOURNAMENT ELITE EIGHT HIGHLIGHTS
