Five Thoughts on Oklahoma State’s 85–69 Win Against Texas A&M-Corpus Christi

STILLWATER — Sunday wasn’t the Cowboys’ toughest game on paper, but Texas A&M-Corpus Christi pushed Oklahoma State more than anyone else has this season.

The Cowboys eventually overpowered the visitors in the second half to secure the 85-69 victory, but OSU held a season-low 2-point lead at the break. Luckily for the Cowboys, OSU had a well-timed reinforcement ready to make his season debut, which proved to be one of the differences on an afternoon when Oklahoma State played a little lackluster at times.

Here are five takeaways from the game.

1. Welcome to Stillwater, Anthony Roy!​

It wasn’t intentional, but Anthony Roy couldn’t have chosen a better way to build excitement for his debut this season. First, he put himself on the map when he scored 28 points in the exhibition win over Auburn, while shooting 5-of-10 beyond the arc.

Then, fans were forced to wait after a preseason groin injury sidelined him for the first three games, allowing him to see his first official action as a Cowboy 3.5 minutes into Sunday’s game when OSU trailed by 1 point.

The game almost immediately began to revolve around Roy as he knocked down 3-of-5 shots to go along with one offensive rebound and one steal in the next five minutes of action. During that same stretch, his teammates finished 2-of-5 from the floor.

Roy finished the game with 15 points after playing 16 minutes in his debut. He seemed to move somewhat cautiously during his first few appearances on the court, almost like he was moving at 85 or 90% speed on certain plays, especially defensively.

At some point, it became clear Roy trusted his body to let himself go because he threw himself up to block a shot that ended with him crashing into the floor out of bounds on a play that he will definitely feel tomorrow.

This was a good first game for Roy, who probably will emerge as an (if not THE) OSU scoring leader this season after he averaged nearly 26 points in 11 games with Doug Gottlieb’s Green Bay squad last season.

But for now…

2. Vyctorius Miller is the Offense​

Vyctorius Miller is OSU’s undisputed No. 1 scoring threat.

That might seem like a dumb thing to say, because either A), it’s not true since he finished second in scoring (13 points) on Sunday behind Roy or B), because it’s obvious following his 30-point effort in the win over Prairie View A&M on Wednesday.

Oklahoma State needed a spark in the second half (more on that soon). It doesn’t seem like a coincidence that it was Miller who scored 4 points in an 8-0 run over two minutes to begin, finally shaking off an Islanders team that tied things up in the opening seconds of the second half.

I could throw a bunch of stats at you, like Miller is second on the team in shooting percentage, shooting 62% on 39 shots, trailing only Andrija Vukovic (75% on 12 shots, all 2s). Miller is third behind the arc, knocking down 42% of those shots, but he leads OSU with eight made 3s (putting him three ahead of his closest competition).

Perhaps the most convincing case for the LSU transfer comes if you toss out his 30-point game entirely. Even under those circumstances, Miller leads the team in overall points and points per game.

OSU scoring leaders overall (minus Miller’s 30-point game):

3. Cowboys Don’t Blink, but They Also Have Yet to Be Truly Challenged

For the fourth consecutive game, Oklahoma State entered the locker room leading at the half. However, this was the slimmest margin as OSU led A&M-Corpus Christi 37-35.

The Cowboys led both Texas A&M and Prairie View by 14 points at the break after leading season-opening opponent Oral Roberts by only 4.

Oklahoma State led by 11 points with 4:42 left in the half, then the team missed four consecutive shots, including three consecutive 3s.

“It is always hard to get your offense out and running if you don’t get defensive stops,” Lutz said. “And in the first half, especially in that last three or four minutes, I mean, we were awful. We were throwing the ball all over the gym, and we weren’t getting back in transition D, and we were turning it over, and they were turning it into points.”

When Lutz called a timeout with 38 seconds left in the first half and OSU not only failed to score, but gave up another basket, it seemed obvious OSU’s halftime conversation wouldn’t be, shall we say, pleasant.

Whatever got said did the trick as OSU put together a 14-3 run in its favor in the first five minutes of the second half. After that, the Islanders never really closed the gap at all.

Similar to the season-opening win over Oral Roberts, Oklahoma State has shown it can separate itself in the second half, no matter how the game starts. What remains to be seen is what the Cowboys do in a close game.

OSU should continue to dominate most of its upcoming opponents, but eventually the Cowboys will have to win a close game in conference play. And this team isn’t getting a ton of experience in that department right now.

4. Utter Dominance

On Sunday, Oklahoma State won its fourth straight game to start the season 4-0 for the first time since former Cowboy Cade Cunningham led OSU to a 6-0 start in the 2020-21 season.

The current Cowboys are beating opponents by 22.8 points per game on average, a number that actually dropped thanks to the season-low 16-point margin of victory.

For comparison, Cunningham’s group won its first four games by 12 points on average and only won one game by 20 points. At the end of the day, the wins matter more than the margin, but this OSU team has a real chance to put together a historic start with South Florida (3-1), Nicholls State (0-4) and Northwestern (4-0) on deck.

5. Two Steps Forward, One Step Back?​

As mentioned, Roy’s debut gave the home crowd plenty to cheer about, but Oklahoma State missed three-game starter Robert Jennings, who had a “flare up” with his hip. Jennings had surgery on his hip over the summer.

“We’re just trying to be cautious,” Lutz said. “Again, kind of with Anthony, could he have come back a week ago (vs. Texas A&M), probably. But it is worth risking further injury or not having them in Big 12 play, probably not.”

The Cowboys also missed Jaylen Curry for the second straight game (flu).

Oklahoma State’s depth has been the real star of the first four games, as eight Cowboys have scored at least 10 points in a game now that Roy and Lefteris Mantzoukas joined the club on Sunday.

Of that group, six have hit that threshold at least twice. So OSU hasn’t needed everyone available, but earlier this week, Lutz spoke about the need to put different rotations through their paces.

On Sunday, Lutz was asked if the Cowboys could get too close to conference play to have that figured out in time. He didn’t address that concern with a specific deadline, but did emphasize the importance of having access to the full roster in the coming weeks.

“I’d like to have it (everyone) sooner than later,” Lutz said. “I’m still trying to figure out what combinations work the best. … We need to get the rotations figured out.”