Javian McCollum starts strong; goes silent in the second half in Oklahoma’s loss to Kansas
The Oklahoma Sooners’ latest attempt to end their 31-year winless streak at Allen Fieldhouse fell short. Now, the Sooners haven’t played at Kansas every season since 1993 but still, they haven’t won despite several close calls.
Porter Moser’s squad played well once again at Kansas. In the first half. They were down only one heading into the second half. But in the second half, their defense and offense struggled as the Jayhawks pulled away to secure the 12-point win.
Javian McCollum had a really strong first half but like the team as a whole struggled in the second half. Moser talked about McCollum’s second-half struggles.
“They do a good job defensively,” Moser said. “I thought Javian created some things to happen. They were coming down and digging on him. Then when we kick it the other guys have got to make better decisions. We just put a lot of pressure on our offense. Especially him and Los (Milos Uzan) when we couldn’t get stops. You’ve got to get stops in this league.”
McCollum finished with 17 points on 5/9 shooting but only had five points in the second half. Three of those were free throws and his one bucket was with about a minute remaining when the game was out of reach.
There is no doubt the Sooners need more production offensively from their other players so the pressure isn’t all on McCollum, Uzan and Otega Oweh going forward.
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