OU women come up short, fall to Indiana in Round 2 of NCAA Tournament

With 2:41 to go, OU had its sights set on the Sweet 16.

The fifth-seeded Sooners led fourth-seeded Indiana 64-60 in front of a sold-out crowd in Bloomington. Oklahoma had been stellar, setting itself up for an upset win and its first Sweet 16 appearance since 2013. But it wasn’t the Sooners’ fate, as Indiana went on a 10-0 run to secure a 75-68 win and eliminate the Sooners.

“It hurts because it’s March, right, at this point, that’s because it hurts,” OU coach Jennie Baranczyk said. “And it hurts because obviously you want to go, and there’s a lot on the line in terms of getting to a Sweet 16, but it also hurts worse when you sit in the locker room with your team after and you realize that’s it. I mean, this is a team that, we’ve gone through a lot. We’ve had a lot of, it’s been a little bit of a roller coaster. But I’m proud of a lot of the things that we’ve done. We play really hard. It’s hard when we don’t put the ball in the hole or we put ’em on the free-throw line or we get down to two seconds and then we’re fouling. I mean, there were a lot of those instances as well.

“So we just needed to do a better job, especially in that fourth quarter, of really just holding our ground. You can credit Indiana for that and also we got to get better. So, that’s I think the hardest part is as a coach you just want to dive in and get better and you have a long time to wait before you get to really dive back into another game.”

Indiana shot 29 free throws to OU’s 13. That ended up being the difference most of the game, especially down the stretch. Skylar Vann led the Sooners in scoring with 20, while Indiana’s Mackenzie Holmes led all scorers with 29. Aubrey Joens added 16 points for OU, going 3-for-3 from beyond the arc.

For OU, it was in control for most of the game until the final minutes.

“I think that they were able to hit shots down the stretch and we weren’t able to get stops, but I think that we worked really hard and did our best,” Joens said.

The crowd at Assembly Hall also clearly played a factor late. Indiana had a crowd of 12,385 in attendance.

“Obviously we didn’t shoot well, so that could be a part of it,” Baranczyk said. “I think you credit a team for that, you also sometimes credit the road for that. So that’s something that — no, I think people were engaged, and I think it was a crowd that — the band’s engaged, I think people — I think the doors opened an hour and a half before, that’s something that’s unique to places. I think it’s loud.

“I never felt like it was something — I think Indiana beat us, it wasn’t necessarily just the crowd that beat us, but I do think that the crowd — you want to play in front of people, and I think Indiana’s also a state that’s obviously educated in basketball, so they see good basketball, so it’s important for them to show up and to be able to see their great team that’s here. And I think that makes it different. So I’m really impressed with the crowd.”

OU still had a successful season in many regards. The Sooners finished 23-10, winning its second consecutive Big 12 regular season title and its third consecutive first-round game in the NCAA Tournament. Baranczyk, who has now finished her third season at OU, has yet to reach the Sweet 16. But is still proud of what her team accomplished this season.

And the future is bright, as OU only loses one scholarship player in Kennady Tucker. For Baranczyk’s Sooners, the future is bright.

“I do think that we genuinely and passionately and deeply really care and love for one another,” Baranczyk said. “And we’re able to fall on our face, we’re able to get back up, we’re able to crawl forward, we’re able to help each other, even in the not so good moments. And it just really hurts and we’ve had a lot of these moments. But I think it’s one of those things that if this team really — I don’t think the story’s done, we have a lot of people that are coming back, we graduate Kennady and obviously Jordan Moser, but if this team, if this can really fuel this team this might be one of those situations where it’s, you know, not never, but maybe it’s more of a not yet.

“So I don’t know if the story’s done. I don’t know if you get to have a story like we’ve had in one season, I think it’s going to be more than one season.”