Mussatto: Why Oklahoma State basketball should hire a coach who wants to run

The Big 12 is the best conference in basketball. Big 12 basketball can also be brutal to watch. It’s physical and calculated. It’s slow.

As Oklahoma State looks for a new head coach to replace Mike Boynton, here’s an idea: run.

If most of the conference is going to play grind-it-out basketball, why not counter with chaos? Play fast. Push the tempo. Take a page from the Thunder playbook and attack the hoop and kick to shooters. Run, run, run, run, run.

Easier said than done, I know. It requires the right personnel — guards and wings who can handle the ball and make smart decisions on the fly. Often it means playing small, without a lumbering center on the floor. Conditioning is key. So is having shooters to space the floor. Big 12 football perfected up-tempo, spread offenses. This is the basketball equivalent.

Apologies for invoking OU in this OSU discussion, but here’s what the late Billy Tubbs, more than a decade ago, told SoonerSports.com about playing fast.

“It’s easier to play offense if you can beat the other team down the floor before they get in position to play defense,” Tubbs said. “Think about it. When you walk the ball down the floor, the defense is already back there ready for you. So they play better. But if you put them in a situation where they're scrambling and they’re not necessarily picking up the same guy all the time, then it’s advantage offense. That’s what you’re always looking for.”

Every fan wants their team to play fast, because win or lose, it’s at least entertaining. And that’s kind of the point, right? Billy Ball, the Seven Seconds or Less Suns, Paul Westhead’s run-and-gun at Loyola Marymount.

OSU basketball has been in a rut. This is a chance to step on the gas.

Before I get to a few coaches who employ this style of play, it’s worth looking at just how slow the bulk of Big 12 basketball teams operate offensively.

There are 362 teams in Division-I basketball. Here’s how each of the current Big 12 teams rank in pace (number of possessions per 40 minutes), according to college basketball stats site warrennolan.com.

More: What went wrong in Mike Boynton's tenure as Oklahoma State men's basketball coach?

Where Big 12 teams rank nationally in pace

• Kansas: 93rd (69.5 possessions/100)

• UCF: 118th (69.1)

• TCU: 124th (68.9)

• Oklahoma: 146th (68.5)

• West Virginia: 146th (68.5)

• Oklahoma State: 166th (68.2)

• Texas: 173rd (68.1)

• BYU: 191st (67.7)

• Iowa State: 240th (66.7)

• Kansas State: 240th (66.7)

• Cincinnati: 253rd (66.5)

• Texas Tech: 310th (65.2)

• Baylor: 316th (65.0)

• Houston: 360th (62.3)

With OU and Texas out, the Big 12 newcomers — Arizona (38th), Utah (39th), Arizona State (54th) and Colorado (102nd) — would take four of the top-five spots in pace.

Playing fast doesn’t equal winning. In the Big 12, playing slow correlated more to success this season. The three slowest teams in pace — Houston, Baylor and Texas Tech — finished first, third and fourth in the Big 12 regular season.

Only two teams in the country play slower than Houston: North Texas and Virginia. Tony Bennett and the tortoises of UVA have won a national championship playing at their pace. Houston is among the national title favorites this season.

So, yeah. Playing slow is just fine, especially when you have suffocating defenses like those of Houston and Virginia. OSU has more or less been caught in the middle. In the last three seasons under Boynton, the Cowboys ranked 174th, 181st and 131st in pace.

Four seasons ago, OSU was 35th. That was Cade Cunningham’s team, Boynton’s lone NCAA Tournament squad at OSU. I’m going to chalk that up to Cunningham being a superstar rather than crediting OSU’s pace, but the two are likely related.

There’s something to be said for trying something different. Be the wild card other teams hate preparing for. Be … fun.

OK, now for five coaching candidates who could implement a fast-paced style:

More: Where does Oklahoma State basketball coaching job rank in the Big 12? Here's our score

Bucky McMillan, Samford

McMillan made our list of 20 candidates.

McMillan, born in Birmingham, was a high school coach in Alabama up until 2020. That’s when Samford, in Homewood, Alabama, hired McMillan as head coach.

McMillan, 40, is in his fourth season. Under him, Samford has gone from six wins, to 21, 21 again to 29 this season.

Samford (29-5, 15-3) just won the Southern Conference Tournament to earn its first NCAA Tournament bid since 2000.

A meteoric rise for McMillan, whose Bulldogs play at the seventh-fastest pace in Division-I hoops. Samford averages 86 points per game, which ranks fifth nationally.

Sign me up for Bucky Ball.

K.T. Turner, Texas-Arlington

Turner is another name from our candidates list, which our man Scott Wright compiled.

Turner would be among my first calls. He’s known as an elite recruiter — a key reason why Kentucky and Texas hired him as an assistant — and he has plenty of local ties.

Turner, 45, played college basketball at Oklahoma City University. He was an assistant coach at Redlands Community College in El Reno once upon a time. He was an assistant at Texas A&M Corpus-Christi, Wichita State and SMU before bigger jobs at Texas, Kentucky and OU — where he spent a season on Porter Moser’s staff.

UT-Arlington gave Turner his first head coaching opportunity. The Mavericks, in Year 1 under Turner, went 18-13 (13-7 WAC).

Turner spent one season at Texas, one at OU and one at Kentucky. Would he leave UT-Arlington after one year? For OSU, I have to imagine he would.

Oh, and Turner coaches a fun brand of basketball. UT-Arlington ranked 21st nationally in pace.

Scott Nagy, Wright State

Nagy isn’t a flashy candidate. The 57-year-old is in his eighth season at Wright State following a 21-year tenure at South Dakota State.

Nagy wins, though. In 2012, he took South Dakota State to its first ever NCAA Tournament. Wright State has twice made the NCAA Tournament under Nagy, who’s led the Raiders to a 107-47 record in Horizon League play.

Wright State ranks 19th nationally in pace, and although the Raiders don’t play much defense (a problem for another day), they average 86.5 points per game. Only Alabama, Kentucky and Arizona average more.

Ryan Ridder, Tennessee-Martin

Ridder got his first D-I head coaching gig at Bethune-Cookman after a successful junior college stint at Daytona State. After three seasons at Bethune-Cookman, Ridder was hired by UT-Martin.

The Skyhawks went 4-14 in the Ohio Valley Conference in Ridder’s first season. They improved to 10-8 last season. This season, Tennessee-Martin went 14-4 in the conference, losing to Morehead State in the conference tournament semifinals.

Ridder’s coaching trajectory is trending up, and his teams play fast. The Skyhawks ranked 10th in pace this season.

Phil Martelli Jr., Bryant

How’s this for a coincidence? In 2004, the last time the Cowboys made the Final Four, No. 2 seed OSU beat No. 1 seed St. Joseph’s in the Elite Eight. St. Joe’s, of course, was coached by Phil Martelli.

Phil Jr. played for his dad at St. Joe’s, graduating in 2003, the year before the Elite Eight matchup.

Phil Martelli Jr., 42, just finished his first year at Bryant, which joined the Division-I ranks in 2008. The Bulldogs went 20-13 (11-5 America East). Bryant, located in Smithfield, Rhode Island, was eliminated by UMass-Lowell in the conference tournament.

Is Martelli a realistic candidate? Probably not. He’s a first-year coach with no regional ties. Bryant to OSU is a big step.

Martelli made the list because his Bulldogs rank No. 1 in the country in pace — 75.1 possessions per 40 minutes.

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Oklahoma State basketball coaching search: Pace of play key for OSU