Liberty basketball bows out of NCAA Tournament in first round after 69-60 loss to Oklahoma State
(photo – NCAA 2021)
Dogged by turnovers and foul trouble from the beginning of the night, Liberty started its fifth March Madness appearance with a strong first half but finished it on a sour note, slumping to a 69-60 loss against Oklahoma State Friday night in the first round.
Senior Elijah Cuffee’s 16 points paced the Flames on a night where offensive rhythm for Liberty was at a premium, but his steely performance on both sides of the ball was not enough to drag the Flames out of a quagmire of turnovers and fouls that left them unable to keep pace with the Cowboys.
“Tonight just wasn’t quite our night,” Coach Ritchie McKay said after the game.
Before the game, the Flames already knew they had their work cut out for them – Oklahoma State’s Cade Cunningham is the potential No. 1 draft pick in the 2021 NBA Draft, and his 15 points on the night demonstrated his talent. But Liberty locked Cunningham down in the first half, holding him to one point and taking in a 30-27 halftime lead after McGhee and Preston combined for a total of 17 points.
But McGhee and Preston would dry up in the second half, scoring only six points between them – while Cunningham found his rhythm, first with free throws and then from the field, knocking down 14 second-half points and icing the game late with a contested 3-pointer over Cuffee’s head.
“I think he’s a great player,” McGhee said. “He never looks uncomfortable or out of whack. I think he got to all the shots he wanted to get, even though in the first half … I think (Cuffee) did a great job of contesting shots and forcing him to miss. But in the second half, even though his shots were contested, he made them when it counted.”
With a player like Cunningham on the opposition, the Flames needed to play a characteristically tight defensive game and use every possession wisely. Their plays just didn’t come together, however, with Oklahoma State’s physicality regularly forcing sloppy passes and keeping the Flames off rhythm.
Liberty averaged 9.7 turnovers per game this season – but Friday the team made 18, nearly doubling that average and demonstrating just how off-kilter the offensive rhythm became as the game wore on.
“It was the difference in the game,” McKay said.
Even with their strong first-half performance, however, the Flames ran into foul issues early on. McGhee and Rode both had two fouls by the end of the half, leaving them on thin ice and keeping them on the bench for much of the beginning of the second half.
Until that point, Liberty had held the edge, leading by as many as six points in the first half, with McGhee showing probably his brightest moment of the game when he seized momentum all on his own, scoring a 3-pointer and a layup within 20 seconds to give Liberty its first lead of the night. But the second half was a different story, with Cunningham slowly finding his rhythm as Liberty barely kept pace.
The lead changed hands a few times as Cuffee tried to wrestle control of the game back from the Cowboys, but once Oklahoma State took the lead with 17:23 left to go, Liberty never took it back. Instead, the Flames found themselves plagued by fouls, with three players finishing with four fouls and two with three – handing the Cowboys 18 points from free throws in the second half.
“They really just put their head down, they drove it, and they were the aggressors,” McKay said. “We obviously got in foul trouble (and) had to rest Darius and Kyle a little bit, when most nights we do a pretty good job of staying out of foul trouble. Tonight wasn’t one of them.”
Spearheaded by Cuffee, Liberty had a late rally in the second half as it tried to find a foothold in the game, but every time Liberty cut the deficit down, a misplaced pass or a poorly-timed foul handed the Cowboys a couple points. Cunningham’s nine points down the stretch in the last three minutes, including the 3-pointer that cemented the win, were too much for the Flames in the end.
With the first-round loss, Liberty is out of the NCAA Tournament, while Oklahoma State will go on to face Oregon State in the second round.
John Nekrasov is the Sports editor for the Liberty Champion. Follow him on Twitter @John_nekrasov