NORMAN — The Oklahoma men’s basketball team plays in its first-ever SEC Tournament game when it meets Georgia on Wednesday at approximately 8:30 p.m. CT at Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, Tenn. The Sooners (19-12, 6-12 SEC) are the No. 14 seed and the Bulldogs (20-11, 8-10) are the No. 11 seed. Wednesday’s first-round contest will be televised by SEC Network with Karl Ravech (play-by-play), Jimmy Dykes (analyst) and Molly McGrath (reporter) announcing. It will air on the Sooner Sports Radio Network (KRXO 107.7 FM The Franchise in Oklahoma City; KTBZ 1430 AM in Tulsa; Varsity Radio App) with Toby Rowland (play-by-play) and Kevin Henry (analyst) on the call. 

The OU-Georgia winner will play No. 6 seed Kentucky on Thursday at approximately 8:30 p.m. CT.

OPENING TIP

• Oklahoma makes its SEC Tournament debut on Wednesday against a Georgia team that has won its last four games after losing four straight. The Bulldogs are 49-61 all-time in the SEC Tournament (1-4 over the last four years) and earned titles in 1983 and 2008. 

• OU is 5-0 in neutral-site games this season. It beat Providence (79-77), No. 24 Arizona (82-77) and Louisville (69-64) on consecutive days in November to win the Battle 4 Atlantis in the Bahamas, trounced Oklahoma State (80-65) in Oklahoma City on Dec. 14 and downed No. 24 Michigan (87-86) in the Jumpman Invitational in Charlotte, N.C., on Dec. 18. In those five games, freshman point guard Jeremiah Fears averaged 20.6 points, 3.2 rebounds, 5.0 assists and 2.0 steals while shooting .500 from the field, .500 from 3-point range (9 for 18) and .857 from the foul line (36 for 42).

• On the season, Oklahoma is the only team with two players who rank in the top 16 in the SEC in scoring, and both Sooners rank in the top 11. Fears ranks 10th (16.3 ppg) and senior forward Jalon Moore ranks 11th (16.2 ppg).

 • In SEC play, Oklahoma, No. 3 Auburn and No. 15 Kentucky are the only teams that ranked in the top six in field goal percentage, 3-point field goal percentage and free throw percentage. OU shot .460 from the field (sixth), .365 from 3-point range (fifth) and .782 from the free throw line (first). 

• OU is one of just five teams in the country with two freshmen who have each scored at least 25 points in a game this season (Fears and Dayton Forsythe). The others are Duke, Central Arkansas, New Orleans and Rutgers. Fears has scored 25-plus points four times and Forsythe netted 25 at Ole Miss (23 in the second half) on March 1.

 • Oklahoma leads the SEC and ranks sixth nationally with its .797 season free throw percentage, which would smash the single-season school record of .767 set by the 2001-02 Final Four team. Over the last three games, OU is shooting .882 from the foul line (67 for 76). 

• Until Saturday at Texas, the Sooners started the same lineup in 14 straight games: forwards Moore and Sam Godwin, and guards Fears, Brycen Goodine and Duke Miles. Godwin got hurt in last Wednesday’s win over Missouri and was replaced on Saturday by graduate forward/center Mohamed Wague. It was Godwin’s first non-start over the last two seasons. Moore and Miles have started every game this season.

 • Goodine shot 47.2% from 3-point range in SEC play (42 for 89) and would have led the league in the category if he had enough makes to qualify (he was three conversions shy). 

• Super senior guard Kobe Elvis is 10 for 17 (.588) from 3-point range over the last five contests. He was 3 for 18 (.167) over the previous eight games.

OU-GEORGIA SERIES HISTORY

• Oklahoma and Georgia have met twice all-time. The Bulldogs won this season’s matchup 72-62 over the No. 17 Sooners on Jan. 11 in Athens, while No. 12 OU posted a 93-90 victory on Dec. 25, 1987, in the Chaminade Christmas Classic championship game in Honolulu, Hawai’i. 

• In this year’s meeting, OU led 36-33 at halftime but was held to .310 field goal and .214 3-point shooting in the second half in the 10-point defeat. The Bulldogs attempted 37 free throws to OU’s nine on the day (four-to-one ratio). Senior forward Jalon Moore was one of four Sooners who scored in double figures, registering game highs of 17 points and nine rebounds. Guards Kobe Elvis and Duke Miles each tallied 14 points, with Elvis adding a team-high-tying five assists and Miles grabbing a season-high five rebounds and posting three assists and two steals. Senior forward/center Mohamed Wague scored 10 points (his second most of the season at the time) and added three rebounds, two assists, two blocks and three steals.

NOTING THE SEC TOURNAMENT

• Kentucky leads all programs with 32 SEC Tournament titles and is followed by Alabama (eight), Tennessee (five), Florida (four), Auburn and Mississippi State (three each), Georgia, Ole Miss and Vanderbilt (two each) and Arkansas and LSU (one each). Missouri, South Carolina and Texas A&M have yet to win the SEC Tournament. 

• This marks the 14th SEC Tournament to be played in Nashville and 12th at Bridgestone Arena. This will be the third straight SEC Tournament played in Nashville, fifth of the last six and 10th of the last 15.

OU IN CONFERENCE TOURNAMENTS

• Oklahoma owns a 47-40 record in conference postseason action, racking up a 23-16 record in the Big Eight Tournament from 1977-1996 and a 24-24 mark in the Big 12 Tournament from 1997-2024. • The Sooners won Big Eight Tournament titles in 1979, 1985, 1988 and 1990, and claimed three straight Big 12 Tournament crowns from 2001-03. • OU is 27-21 in its opening game in postseason conference tournament play (12-8 in Big Eight and 15-13 in Big 12). • Former head coaches Kelvin Sampson (1995-2006) and Billy Tubbs (1981-1994) each directed the Sooners to 18 conference tournament wins. Sampson was 18-9 and Tubbs 18-11. They each won three titles. 

• Under Sampson, OU won 10 straight Big 12 Tournament games from 2001-2004.

SOONERS HEATING UP

• Oklahoma has won three of its last five games, with the two losses coming by a total of four points. Two of the three wins came against ranked teams (93-87 over No. 21 Mississippi State and 96-84 over No. 15 Missouri, both at home) and the other at rival Texas on Saturday (76-72) to snap an eight-game series skid. The defeats came at the hands of No. 17 Kentucky (83-82) and at Ole Miss (87-84). OU had the lead in the final 20 seconds of both losses. 

• Over the five-game stretch, the Sooners are shooting .509 from the field, .404 from 3-point range and .811 from the free throw line.

CHEERS FOR FEARS

• Four-time SEC Freshman of the Week Jeremiah Fears and Duke’s Cooper Flagg are the nation’s only freshmen to average at least 16.0 points, 4.0 rebounds, 4.0 assists and 1.5 steals per game. Fears is the only SEC player, regardless of class, to average those minimums. 

• Over the last six games, Fears, who was named this week to the SEC All-Freshman Team, is averaging 20.7 points, 4.8 rebounds and 5.7 assists. He is 45 for 52 (.865) from the free throw line during the stretch. Since the start of the 1996-97 season (play-by-play era), Fears, first-team All-America point guard and National Freshman of the Year Trae Young (in 2017-18) and Los Angeles Lakers star Austin Reaves (in 2020-21) are the only Sooners to average at least 20.0 points, 4.5 rebounds and 5.5 assists over a six-game span. Fears is the only SEC player to accomplish the feat this season and one of just six over the past 10 seasons to do it.

THERE’S ONLY ONE

• Oklahoma is the only team in the nation that has had six players each score at least 25 points in a game this season (Kobe Elvis, Jeremiah Fears, Dayton Forsythe, Brycen Goodine, Duke Miles and Jalon Moore). No other Power Four team has had more than four players score at least 25 in a game on the year.