Bedlam basketball debate
I got an interesting email this week from OU fan named Geoff. I thought it was very interesting, so I’m posting it separate from my usual email bag, which will come later.
“I am going to submit to you what I think is one of the biggest misconceptions in the Oklahoma sports world. It is the fact that many media members and fans of both schools feel as though OSU has a better basketball program and a better history than OU basketball. Keep in mind that I do believe that OSU has a really quality program and a lot of great tradition (Iba was an amazing coach and won them two championships), but please take a moment and read these stats, and tell me what you think. I think some of them may surprise you.
The Big Eight, as we knew it, came into being for the 1958-59 season. From the 1958-59 season to 2008-09:
OSU
Total win/loss record: 802-640, .554
NCAA tournament appearances: 16
Final 4 appearances: 2
Title game appearances: 0
NIT appearances: 5
Conference titles: 2 Big 8 (1 shared), 1 Big 12
Conference tournament titles: 2 Big 8, 2 Big 12
OU
Total win/loss record: 933-543, .630
NCAA tournament appearances: 24
Final 4 appearances: 2
Title game appearances: 1
NIT appearances: 7
Conference titles: 5 Big 8, 1 Big 12 (shared)
Conference tournament titles: 4 Big 8, 3 Big 12
Overall head to head since 58-59: OU 66, OSU 47
“In the 51 seasons since OSU joined the Big Eight, OU has a better conference record 36 times, OSU 11.
Since the inception of the Big 12 conference, OSU has only finished ahead of OU in the conferences standings one time.
So, you want to go back all-time?
Overall record: OU 1,468-936 (.611) OSU 1452-1018 (.588).
Bedlam Wins: OU 126, OSU 89
Winning coaches: OU 10, OSU 6
All-Americans: OU 22, OSU 17
Conference titles: OU 22, OSU 17
1,000-point scorers: OU 35, OSU 30
Draft selections: OU 42, OSU 32
NCAA appearances: OU 26, OSU 23
Home-court win streak: OU 51, OSU 46
“OU has spent more weeks in the AP poll than OSU. OU has had more winning seasons than OSU. OU has a better all time home winning percentage than OSU. OU has made it to 4 Final Fours (two championship games).
OSU has won two national championships (’45 and ‘46) in basketball. This is a stat that simply cannot be ignored, and really the main reason why the Cowboys are even in the ballpark with Oklahoma in terms of basketball program comparisons. I will not take anything away from their accomplishments but consider this:
1. These championships happened 62 and 63 years ago. Most of us on this board were not even born when the Cowboys won the championship. Before you bombard me with the 50’s football championships, at least we have won one in the new millennium (2000), and, this is about basketball, not football.
2. The road to winning the championship was a lot less meddlesome back in the old A&M days. The Aggies only had to win three (3) games to be crowned the champion unlike the grueling six games of the modern era. That is certainly not the Cowboy’s fault, but should at least be mentioned. Four of OSU’s six Final Fours were obtained via this three-game system. Two of Oklahoma’s 4 were also obtained this way. Eight of Oklahoma State’s 11 Elite 8 appearances were accomplished by only having to win two games in the tournament. Three of OU’s eight Elite 8 appearances were won in this fashion.
3. The good old NIT was still a major player during this time. It was an era in which the NCAA was battling for dominance. While it is debatable which tournament ran supreme during these championships, one thing is for sure, not all the good teams were playing in the NCAA tournament. Could that of impacted OSU’s two victories? Who knows? But again, worth mentioning.
4. All-American Bob Kurland was a game-changing center for the Pokes. There was no goal tending back then, so the big 7-footer could just sit back and guard the goal until the cows came home. It was certainly within the rules of the day, but it obviously gave the Cowboys a big advantage that they wouldn’t have had a few years later (because of Kurland).
If OSU fans really want to use all of that success from the Iba days as the main basis of claiming superiority over Oklahoma (despite all the facts that I have presented in this comparison), then I think they might be living in the past just a tad!”
Well, Geoff, I certainly thank you. That’s a lot of research, and while much of it has been done before, it remains very interesting.
The Bedlam basketball debate is long-standing and quite fascinating.
First off, I would disagree with the whole premise, that the Oklahoma media gives OSU basketball the edge. I think this whole argument stems from the Eddie Sutton era, in which fan support at OSU superseded fan support at OU.
Most people who give OSU an edge do so because of Gallagher-Iba Arena. Its attendance and its atmosphere. In the post-Eddie era, when the fan support withered, no one really argues that OSU has the better program.
As for which program is most successful, it’s entirely how you want to define success.
Head-to-head? OU, but if you count this, you have to swallow the OU-Texas head-to-head football rivalry, in which the Longhorns have had a 20-game lead over the Sooners for most of the last 70 years.
Conference supremacy? OU
NCAA championships? OSU, and any talk of how OSU’s 1945 and 1946 titles were won in inferior eras has to take us to OU football’s three national titles in the 1950s, which were won before any black player was on a roster south of the Mason-Dixon Line, including OU. To question Iba’s national titles because of the goal-tending rule is like saying Bud Wilkinson’s early great teams were a product of World War II veterans. It’s clear to me that OSU basketball with a goal-tending rule would have been much closer to its eventual success than OU football without all those 22-year-old veterans who showed up in 1946.
And since we’re talking history, I never pass up the chance to remind people of 1945. After OSU’s NCAA title, the Cowboys played a Red Cross benefit game against NIT champ DePaul, beating the Blue Demons at Madison Square Garden in what was one of the biggest games in college basketball history. A game that ranks with OU-Notre Dame 1957 football in terms of national impact.
Anyway, for me, college basketball is the easiest sport in which to debate programs, because of the NCAA Tournament. Just add up the wins. And in that regard, OSU is head of OU. The Cowboys are 38-22 in the NCAAs; OU is 35-26. That’s very close, by the way. OSU is 18th nationally, I think, while OU is 21st.
Geoff is right. More of those OSU victories came in a previous era, which adds weight to OU, in the same way football wins 50-60 years ago don’t count the same way as football wins in the last 20 years, else we’ll be forced to say Army and Navy still have great football programs.
A few years ago, I ranked the college basketball programs. I had OSU No. 19 and OU No. 20. I did it again several months ago and had OU slightly ahead of OSU.
I think they’re very close. In head-to-head matchups of all kinds of comparisons, yes, OU is ahead. In the categories that matter most, NCAA titles and NCAA victories, OSU is ahead.
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Comments
One of the big differences between OU Football and OSU Basketball is after OU won their National Titles in the 70’s and 80’s they were always shortly out on Probation. There is a reason why OU leads the country in Probation. It can be directly associated with their sucess. “Its not cheating until you get caught” should be the motto.
There is a direct relationship between the sucess of OU Athletics and cheating. There is no doubt that OU has a great athletic program, but it has a high price tag. OU is the leader in probation. “Its not cheating until you get caught.”
It seems that OU fans have this entitledment additude where they think every game and every title belongs to them no matter what the sport. They have the additude that have a better program than OSU in every sport. I have heard many of our local sports experts say that OSU has a better overall sports program than OU. I think it is true because we support all sports and nor just footballl. If it was not for Joe C forcing football season ticket holders to also buy basketball season tickets no one would show up to the basketball games. OU even offers to send a bus full of pizza, cokes, and game tickets to the dorms and frat houses but no none will show up. I think OU will always have an attendance problem since the LNC is so far from anything from campus. If was to compare who had the better programs this is how I would rate them;
Football-OU
Mens Basketball-OSU
Women’s Basketball-OU
Soccer-OSU
Wrestling-OSU
Baseball-OSU
Softball-OU
Men’s Golf-OSU
Women’s Golf-OSU
Track and Field-OU
Cross Country-OSU
Men’s Tennis-OSU
Women’s Tennis-OSU
The difference between OU’s “ancient” success in football and OSU’s even older success in basketball is that OU has gone on to win four other national titles since the 1950s — two in the 1970s, one in the 1980s, and one this decade — so they don’t rely strictly — or even primarily — on those titles for their football legitimacy.
Take away those 1950’s titles, and OU is still undeniably one of the greatest football programs in the country.
OSU, on the other hand, has won no — zero, zip, nada — hoops titles in the six decades since they took home those two trophies, yet they rely almost entirely upon those titles for their claims of basketball supremacy.
The truth is this: You take away those two sixty-year-old titles, and they’re not even in OU’s league in basketball, while you can take away OU’s first three football champsionships, and the Sooners are still among the national elite.
Put another way: If OU had never won another football title after their first three championships but they continued to tout those titles to anyone who would listen, insisting, as most Pokes fans (and certain columnists) do, that they are still a prominent national program because of those dusty trophies and the atmosphere at Memorial Stadium, most observers would be torn between mocking and pitying the delusional Sooner faithful.
But that’s exactly where things stand with OSU basketball. We’re asked to give them credit for the success they enjoyed sixty years ago, as if the ensuing decades had never happened.
Princeton was once a dominant football power — should they still be credited for their gridiron success of yore?
As for comparing the head-to-head Bedlam hoops results to Texas’ lead over OU in football, you’ve got it wrong: Texas’ lead in the Red River Rivalry was built entirely before World War II — the series is virtually even since then.
But OU’s lead over OSU was built both before Henry Iba’s arrival in Stillwater and since his departure after the 1970 season.
Here are the facts: Prior to Iba’s first win over the Sooners in 1935, OU led in Bedlam basketball by a laughable count of 44-9. Yes, that was a long time ago, but it’s not the whole story.
Since Iba’s final defeat of the Sooners in 1970, OU leads the head-to-head results, 55-31.
In fact, the only period during which OSU can claim dominance over OU was during Iba’s tenure. In the decades before and after his time in Stillwater, OU has beaten OSU by a wide margin head-to-head.
Granted, the Iba years were grand ones for OSU (though the ’60s were rather dire), but it’s all they have. Prior to Iba’s arrival, the Sooners’ performance on the Bedlam hard court resembled their football dominance of the Cowboys, and after Iba’s departure, they began to dominate the series again. Twenty-four more wins over 39 seasons ain’t hay.