When Selection Sunday came and went, a number of programs were upset about being snubbed from the Field of 68. A few notable ones include Rick Pitino’s St. John’s team, the viral Indiana State squad, and Porter Moser’s Oklahoma Sooners. During Tuesday’s press conference, the Oklahoma basketball head coach still was searching for answers and proceeded to lay into the process of the tournament selection, per Mason Young of Tulsa World.
‘“I can’t get an answer from anybody to tell me why.” – Porter Moser on #sooners being left out of NCAA Tournament’
Oklahoma’s absence from the field was a surprise, especially with the fact they were regulars in a lot of bracketology projections leading into Sunday. Moser also added that the “range of emotions were raw” after Oklahoma was snubbed from the Big Dance.
Porter Moser joins Rick Pitino in questioning the Selection Committee
The process of fielding the teams for the NCAA Tournament has once again been a big topic of conversation. Every season, teams are left off as conference champions make a stunning run in their respective tournaments. This year, those schools included Oregon, New Mexico, and NC State, among others.
St. John’s head coach Rick Pitino had no issues making his feelings known after the Red Storm was left out of the Big Dance. Now, Porter Moser is doing the same, per Josh Callaway of 247Sports.
“The system is flawed because you hear different reasons why each team got in… There’s no consistency of why a team got in.”
The Oklahoma basketball team had a terrific case to get into the field. They finished the year with a 20-11 record and an 8-10 mark in the Big 12 Conference. That conference mark might seem bad, but all of Houston, Iowa State, Baylor, Texas Tech, BYU, Kansas, TCU, and Texas got bids to the Big Dance, so it is a talented group.
The Sooners also had wins over Iowa, Iowa State, and BYU. Unfortunately, perhaps losing six of the final eight games gave the Committee the wrong impression about the Sooners. Regardless, as Moser mentioned, he is still searching for answers on why they were left out.
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