Aggies cruise past Oklahoma State in Brooklyn 72-55

Breaking news alert, Robert Williams didn’t forget how to play basketball in the offseason.

Williams didn’t disappoint in his return to action on Monday, scoring 11 on five dunks to help lead A&M to a 72-55 rout of Oklahoma State at the Progressive Legends Classic in Brooklyn. The Aggies will face the winner of Penn State and Pitt on Tuesday.

Since this is the first postgame breakdown for me, I’m going to follow gigthem08’s lead with the format. Sort of.

First, the bad stuff

We allowed too many offensive rebounds, and we picked up some silly fouls. If the game were close, it might have mattered.

It wasn’t, so it didn’t.

The Aggies also started the second half slow, but Oklahoma State never got the lead inside of ten points in the second half.

Quickfire thoughts on the coaching

• Kennedy did the same thing with Williams that he did with Admon Gilder and DJ Hogg coming back from suspension, and Williams came off the bench. You don’t just violate undisclosed team rules and start as soon as you come back!
• It drives some people nuts that Kennedy doesn’t call timeouts when the other team makes a run, but I actually like coaches that try to teach their teams how to pull themselves together. I also think letting it go early in the season could help A&M later in the season.
• Kennedy mixed in some zone to change up the tempo a little bit in the second half. It’s good to see we’re still practicing that because there will be times that due to foul trouble or something we’re going to need to be able to play it.
• There’s also just something to be said for the fact that we smoked a second power conference team, that doesn’t happen by accident. The fact that these games look so easy is probably a good indicator that our practices with this deep roster are anything but.

Who won us the game?

• DJ Hogg - 18 points, 7 boards, 3 assists - Look, if you don’t bother DJ Hogg physically, you’re in for a long night. Oklahoma State let him get free early, and he made them pay. Hogg is now shooting 65% from beyond the arc. Which is unsustainable, but still awesome.
• Robert Williams - do the stats really matter? LOOK AT THIS AGAIN:

• Duane Wilson - 8 points, 6 assists - Wilson looked good running the team tonight, and twice when Oklahoma State mounted small runs, he took the ball to the basket and got easy points in response. Will be interesting to see what happens at point when Caldwell starts playing on Friday
• TJ Starks - 9 points, 6 boards, 4 assists - This guy is really going to be something. Starks has that “I’m about to score and you can’t do anything about it” mentality with the ball that we haven’t had in a while

What’s next?

The Ags will almost definitely face Penn State The Ags face the winner of Penn State and Pitt tomorrow at 5 PM central for the championship of the Legends Classic.

It shouldn’t be close.