Cade Cunningham’s one season of college basketball got its first real test on Tuesday night on the road against the Marquette Warriors. I still call Marquette the Warriors because before political correctness took over our world that’s what they were named in 1977 when Al McGuire’s team came to Oklahoma City and won a regional on their way to winning the NCAA Championship.
Granted…this isn’t Al McGuire’s Marquette program, but the program did make the tournament three years in a row heading into this season under Coach Woj.
This was a nice win for Mike Boynton’s ball club. There’s seven or eight teams in the rugged Big 12 this season who are probably better than Marquette, but this was still a solid win for the very young Cowboys.
15-6-3…those were Cade Cunningham’s very steady numbers in this game. He didn’t shoot the ball all that much…especially from beyond the arc. But what he did do was impact the game with his leadership and court smarts.
Back in 2007– I watched Kevin Durant, Michael Beasley, and Blake Griffin play Big 12 hoops. Now…we’re only three games in so I won’t go ga-ga this early because I want to see Cade play in all of the Big 12 games on the schedule…but I would say with some caution attached Cade has a chance to be better than all three of these guys as an NBA player.
Two of those guys won National Player of the Year honors, but Cade potentially has the whole package to be better than Kevin Durant.
While I’m on here today I want to shout out for the other freshman on Boynton’s club who’s quite a player himself…Rondel Walker from PC West. Rondel was probably the second best player in Oklahoma high school hoops last season and the best player in the Oklahoma City area.
Be sure and watch Rondel when he enters the games. He’s instant impact coming off Mike Boynton’s bench.
Boynton potentially has a nice little ball team on his hands if the COVID doesn’t disrupt the flow of the college season. Next up for O State are Oakland (Michigan), Oral Roberts, and Wichita State before Big 12 play gets going for the Cowboys.
I think once the Cowboys get into Big 12 play the question for them will be is if they have enough interior physicality to hang with Kansas and Baylor on the boards. But here’s the thing…Cade at 6’9″ rebounds like Russell Westbrook.
I plan on watching every O State game this season just like Sam Presti is going to do and call it my Cade Cunningham Journal on my blog.
Cade Cunningham 15 PTS, 6 REB, 3 AST Full Highlights | Oklahoma St vs Marquette 12.1.20 – YouTube