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On This Day in OU Hoops History: Buddy Buckets Lights up OKC

In his final game in the state of Oklahoma, Hield ripped VCU for 36 points
John E. Hoover|
On This Day in OU Hoops History: Buddy Buckets Lights up OKC
On This Day in OU Hoops History: Buddy Buckets Lights up OKC

Oklahoma’s 2020 college basketball season came to an unceremonious and premature end when the NCAA declared this year’s tournament would not be played due to measures intended to stop the Coronavirus pandemic.

The Sooners just might have assembled the kind of team — a Big Three scoring triumvirate and a collection of young, athletic talent — that could have possibly made a good postseason run.

This team’s resume will always be incomplete.

Instead of using three weeks this spring to witness OU basketball history, SI Sooners will relive it. From now until April 4 — the date that was supposed to be this year’s Final Four semifinals — we’ll look back on Oklahoma’s most memorable NCAA Tournament games from that date in history.

March 20, 2016

(2) Oklahoma 85, (10) VCU 81

What a sendoff for Buddy Buckets.

Oklahoma’s high-scoring star guard, in his final game in the state of Oklahoma, lit up VCU for 36 points at Chesapeake Energy Arena in Oklahoma City to send the Sooners to the Sweet Sixteen with an 85-81 victory.

With the crowd chanting “Buddy! Buddy!” In the final minutes, Hield blistered the nets with 19 points in the final eight minutes as OU held off the Rams.

“This is the big stage,” Hield said. “It’s win or go home. It’s my senior year. NCAA Tournament. Everybody is watching. You don’t get those moments very often, so you go out there, you’ve got to bring it.”

Hield, who went on to win multiple national player of the year awards in leading the Sooners to the Final Four, didn’t even score in the first 10 minutes and finished the first half just 2-for-8 from the floor.

But he was 9-of-12 after halftime and recorded his 13th career 30-point game — tied for the most in Big 12 history. Of those, 29 came in the second half.

“It seemed like every shot that he had that we needed,” said OU coach Lon Kruger, “he stepped up and made it.”

Jordan Woodard scored 17 for the Sooners, and Isaiah Cousins had 15 as OU improved to 27-7 and advanced to the Sweet Sixteen (this time in Anaheim, California) for the second straight year.

VCU led 65-63 in the second half before Hield erupted for eight points in two minutes, including two 3-pointers that put OU ahead to stay. Hield finished 6-of-14 from 3-point range. He scored 26 of the Sooners’ final 31 points.

“Best player I’ve seen in college basketball,” said VCU coach Will Wade.

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John E. Hoover
JOHN E. HOOVER

John is an award-winning journalist whose work spans five decades in Oklahoma, with multiple state, regional and national awards as a sportswriter at various newspapers. During his newspaper career, John covered the Dallas Cowboys, the Kansas City Chiefs, the Oklahoma Sooners, the Oklahoma State Cowboys, the Arkansas Razorbacks and much more. In 2016, John changed careers, migrating into radio and launching a YouTube channel, and has built a successful independent media company, DanCam Media. From there, John has written under the banners of Sporting News, Sports Illustrated, Fan Nation and a handful of local and national magazines while hosting daily sports talk radio shows in Oklahoma City, Tulsa and statewide. John has also spoken on Capitol Hill in Oklahoma City in a successful effort to put more certified athletic trainers in Oklahoma public high schools. Among the dozens of awards he has won, John most cherishes his national "Beat Writer of the Year" from the Associated Press Sports Editors, Oklahoma's "Best Sports Column" from the Society of Professional Journalists, and Two "Excellence in Sports Medicine Reporting" Awards from the National Athletic Trainers Association. John holds a bachelor's degree in Mass Communications from East Central University in Ada, OK. Born and raised in North Pole, Alaska, John played football and wrote for the school paper at Ada High School in Ada, OK. He enjoys books, movies and travel, and lives in Broken Arrow, OK, with his wife and two kids.

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