EmailPrintOpen Extended ReactionsThe Oklahoma women's basketball team had lost three games in a row, all to fellow ranked SEC teams: Ole Miss, Kentucky and LSU. In the process, the Sooners dropped from No. 5 to No. 16 in the Associated Press poll. Then Thursday, they got one of the program's biggest victories, led by freshman guard Aaliyah Chavez.Oklahoma upset No. 2 South Carolina 94-82 in overtime, the program's third win in 35 all-time games against AP top-two opponents. The others were vs. No. 2 Kansas State in 2024 and vs. No. 2 Texas in 2004.After the game, ESPN cameras showed Sooners coach Jennie Baranczyk telling her team in a huddle, "We're f---ing back!""What I meant by that was not, 'We're back, take notice,' but that we're back to who we are," Baranczyk said. "This has been a hard, hard, hard two weeks that has felt like two months. It's been challenging, and we've had hard conversations and way more tears than ever. So when I say, 'We're back!' ... that's what I mean. It's not that I'm trash talking."Chavez, one of the front-runners for national freshman of the year, took over in overtime, scoring 15 of her game-high 26 points and going 5-of-5 from the field."It was big on my teammates, because they kept on telling me to keep on shooting," said Chavez, who also had 8 assists. "Just knowing they trusted me brought my confidence up."Oklahoma's 12-point winning margin is tied for the second-largest in overtime against an AP top-two opponent in the NCAA women's era, which began in 1981-82. Utah beat No. 2 UCLA by 13 points on Jan. 22, 2024, and Virginia Tech beat No. 2 NC State by 12 points on Jan. 28, 2021.Oklahoma senior center Raegan Beers had 18 points and 14 rebounds, while junior forward Sahara Williams had 12 and 10. Senior guard Payton Verhulst had 19 points. The Sooners outrebounded South Carolina 54-39.Junior guard Tessa Johnson led South Carolina (19-2) with 19 points, while senior guard Ta'Niya Latson was held to six points, going 1-of-10 from the field. Oklahoma's 94 points were the most the Gamecocks have allowed since losing 95-89 to Arkansas in the 2019 SEC tournament quarterfinals, which was WNBA superstar A'ja Wilson's senior season with South Carolina."We ran into a team that actually wanted to win more, and they made winning plays. And we didn't," South Carolina coach Dawn Staley said of the Sooners. "We didn't do enough to win, and when you do that in our league, especially on the road, you pay for it. It's not familiar territory for us, but our goals are still in front of us, every single one of them. We'll live, we'll learn, we'll move on."South Carolina hosts No. 5 Vanderbilt on Sunday (ESPN, 3 p.m. ET) and will try to give the Commodores their first loss of this season. Vanderbilt (20-0) is tied with Tennessee atop the SEC at 6-0, with South Carolina now 5-1.Oklahoma (15-4, 3-3) now gets a little break from the top of the SEC, as it faces unranked Auburn and Texas A&M next before meeting AP top-five teams Texas and Vanderbilt."I saw our energy back," Baranczyk said. "Aaliyah, especially in that overtime, I thought she was just like, 'Let's go!' The joy she played with and the energy she played with ... everybody on her team knows that's in her."
