About 15 minutes after Sherri Coale knew her Oklahoma women would be given the chance to advance to the Final Four through Oklahoma City, the Sooners, huddled in Coale's den and began chanting "O-K-C, O-K-C."
It wasn't but a moment after the Sooners were announced as the No. 4 seed in the regional, with a Sunday date against No. 13-seed Illinois State. The celebration was so loud, and lasted so long, the Sooners had to be told later where they would be playing the Redbirds.
In all the commotion, nobody heard.
As it turned out, the news kept getting better.
OU will play Illinois State, of the Missouri Valley Conference, at 11 a.m. at Purdue University's Mackey Arena in West Lafayette, Ind., the same place the Sooners jumped into the national spotlight for the very first time, earning entry into the 2002 Sweet Sixteen by upsetting the defending national champion Boilermakers on their home court, back when the first two rounds of the women's NCAA Tournament took place at 16 campus sites, all in the name of attendance.
Still, it was earlier Coale knew most of it.
When it was announced Oklahoma State would be the No. 3 seed in the New Orleans Regional, Coale put on a silent look that seemed to simultaneously say, "How about that?" and "Amazing." Because if the Cowgirls had to go through the Big Easy, which will be quite hard if they have to face LSU an hour from Baton Rouge (or top-seed North Carolina), then the Sooners' road was sure to go through the capital city of their home state.
Coale said she was thinking a little of everything in the moment and after about 30 seconds of thought, explained it in full.
"I just felt like, in some sense, we got a break. Like, we got a break," she said. "I said this to our team in Columbia (Mo.), when we played that miserable game, but got a steal and scored and saved ourselves in the end. You've got to be good and you've got to be lucky, and if I get to choose, I'd like to be both. But you don't get to choose. And for whatever reason, we got kind of lucky."
To even have a chance to turn that luck into anything, OU will have to get past the Redbirds (26-6, 13-5 - tied for first with Drake and Evansville in the Missouri Valley) Sunday and the winner of the Notre Dame-SMU game on Tuesday.
Tennessee is the No. 1 seed in the Oklahoma City Regional, the same team the Sooners led in the final minute before losing 70-67 Nov. 22 at the St. Petersburg Times Forum in Tampa, Fla.
If OU can win two games on Purdue's court and two more in Oklahoma City, it will head back to to the same arena for the Final Four.
Luck was very much the right sentiment.
With Oklahoma State advancing to the final of the Big 12 tournament, the conventional wisdom that had the Sooners' road traveling through the Ford Center had switched in favor of the Cowgirls. Even the Sooners were believing it.
"It was just like, 'Wow,' they didn't get it," said Amanda Thompson of the moment the Cowgirls' draw appeared. "We all thought they would but they didn't."
Coale believed two factors gave OU the nod.
One was a strong schedule that included Maryland, Tennessee, Michigan State, Illinois, Tulsa, South Carolina and Georgia, as well a the Big 12, which advanced eight teams (tied for most with the 16-team Big East) into the NCAA Tournament.
The other was OU's fans, because "regardless of who we're playing or when we're playing," Coale said, Lloyd Noble Center remains among the most popular women's college basketball venues in the nation.
But if the fans helped give them a chance to come back close to home, it's the Sooners themselves who must do something they haven't done since Feb. 27 just to get there.
Win.
OU Sports
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