OU Notepad: Tae Davis drawing high praise from Porter Moser at SEC Media Days

As the season approaches for Porter Moser and the Oklahoma men’s basketball team, Moser and three players — Tae Davis, Nijel Pack, and Derrion Reid — traveled to Birmingham, Alabama, on Wednesday for SEC Media Days. It marked the first opportunity to hear from Moser about his transfer portal class and the new-look roster entering his second season in the SEC.
Here’s what was said:
Davis impressing on the defensive end
One of Oklahoma’s four transfer portal additions was Davis, a Notre Dame transfer who averaged 15.1 points and 5.3 rebounds for the Fighting Irish. He brings proven scoring at the high-major level to Oklahoma’s roster, but one thing Moser made sure to emphasize when speaking about Davis was his potential on the defensive end.
“Obviously he scored a lot,” Moser said. “We lost some scoring, and I knew he could score, but I challenged him. I said, ‘Tae, I think you could be an elite defender.’ That’s a ticket to win at this level and to play at the next level. I’ll say it, from the eight weeks in the summer and the first six weeks right now, I’m usually not that guy getting on a platform like this saying it, but he could be National Defensive Player of the Year. You ask any one of our guys who they don’t like switching onto them in practice, they’ll all say Tae Davis. He’s that good of a defender. He’s buying into it and he’s really embraced it.”
When asked about his growth on that end, Davis echoed his coach’s mindset.
“It’s something that I really take pride in. It’s something that Coach also takes pride in. It’s a big thing for our team. I think as a team we are very good and long defensively and able to do a lot of damage defensively.”
The Sooners’ starting frontcourt will be big and long this year, and along with Davis, Moser likes the defensive ability of the two players expected to start alongside him.
“I think we’ve got some other guys. Derrion Reid, who came from Alabama, he’s another big 6-foot-8 guard who can defend. Mo Wague is 6-foot-10. We’ve got some versatility in that front line that can defend and is taking pride in defending.”
Replacing Jeremiah Fears
One of the main storylines heading into the season is how Porter Moser and the Sooners will replace Jeremiah Fears. Moser noted that it will be by committee in Oklahoma’s backcourt, but it starts with Miami transfer Nijel Pack, who has averaged 14.3 points on 40.3% shooting from three across his five college seasons, and St. Joe’s transfer Xzayvier Brown, who averaged 17.6 points and 4.3 assists last year.
“We went out in the portal and got two older guards that have been on the stage a lot. Nijel Pack has been All-Big 12, he’s played on the stage of the Final Four, and I know this having coached guys that have gone to the Final Four. When they come back, it’s not like they’re satisfied, they want that again. I have that veteran hunger that Nijel brings. And then we went and got Xzayvier Brown, another veteran in the backcourt, played at St. Joe’s. Great league in the A-10, he was first team all-league there. So I’ve got a backcourt with two guys that have been first team all-conference in two different very good leagues.”
They’ll also need returnee Dayton Forsythe to continue his development and provide a spark off the bench, as he did last season.
“The combination of them and Dayton Forsythe, who played a lot last year for us. And I’ll say this about him: there’s not a lot of freshmen last year that came off the bench and had three double-figure games. I don’t know if there’s ten of them. Dayton was one of them. I think he’s a guy that got valuable experience last year. So it’s going to be by committee.”
Embracing the transfer portal
Moser and the Sooners put together an elite transfer portal class between Davis, Pack, Brown, and Alabama transfer Derrion Reid, who averaged six points per game for the Crimson Tide as a freshman but was a McDonald’s All-American out of high school and brings immense potential. Moser said that this season he has fully embraced the transfer portal.
“There’s been so much talk the last few years about the portal, and I’m just all about leaning into it. People came to me and said, ‘Porter, you were at a program at Loyola where you developed guys, this has got to be driving you crazy,’ and I went through that time period. But now I’m completely leaning into it. You get a freshness about getting new guys. I’ve leaned into these four guys. They all played at a high level. That was important to me. Winning mattered to all four of them — that was important to me. I wanted to add length. Night in and night out in the SEC, the first thing you really notice is the length, athleticism, and talent. Adding Tae Davis at 6-foot-9 and Derrion Reid at 6-foot-8 gives you two very versatile players. And then we got the two guards. So I think that’s what we leaned into, guys that have been on that stage and aren’t going to have that huge adjustment period.
“And then combining it with guys that are in your program. One guy I was just talking about is Mo Wague. Mo Wague is a guy that I’m really hoping picks up where he left off. When Sam Godwin got hurt last year, Mo played those last five games. In 20 minutes a game, he averaged nine points and six rebounds, and those were all high-level games. Having him come back, I think he’s really going to pick up where he left off, and I love how he’s been.”
The first opportunity to watch this year’s team will come when the Sooners play an exhibition against No. 24 Wisconsin on October 24 at 7 p.m. CT on Big Ten Network+.