The Buy Game Bit Back in Norman

Every November, big programs pay smaller ones to come take a loss on opening night. Monday at Lloyd Noble Center, East Texas A&M took the trip, took the lead with 12:59 left in the first half — and never gave it back. The Lions beat Oklahoma 68-64 in a season opener for both teams, and the Associated Press reported it was East Texas A&M's first win over a power-conference opponent in school history.

This was not a ranked team sleepwalking into a trap. This was the spread itself making history: Oklahoma closed as a 28.5-point favorite, and per ESPN Research the result is the second-largest Division I upset by point spread in the last 30 years. The only bigger one: Eastern Illinois beating Iowa in 2022 as a 30.5-point underdog.

They took the lead and kept it

The Lions went ahead 13-12 with 12:59 before halftime and never trailed again. Oklahoma made just eight field goals in the first half, shot 29.6 percent, and went 2-of-11 from three on its way to a 34-25 halftime hole, Sports Illustrated reported. Less than three minutes into the second half, East Texas A&M had hit its first three 3-pointers after the break and stretched the lead to 16.

Oklahoma's run came, because it had to. The Sooners ripped off 13 straight, capped by a Tyler Hendricks dunk, to pull within three with 13:51 left. Derrion Reid's layup tied it 58-58 at the 4:55 mark, according to USA Today. With 3:44 remaining and a chance to finally take the lead, B.J. Edwards missed a pair of free throws. Thomas Duchamp answered with a layup at 3:08. The game tied again at 60-60 with 2:51 left — and then Bo Aldridge drove for a layup at 2:33 that kicked off a 6-0 run and a 66-60 lead with 1:12 to play.

The last 25 seconds

Oklahoma still nearly stole it. After a turnover and a shot-clock violation forced by the Lions' defense, Hendricks got a hand on an inbounds pass, the ball found Pop Isaacs, and Isaacs finished through a foul for a three-point play that cut it to 66-64 with 25 seconds left. Duchamp then missed the front end of a one-and-one — one more door opened. Hendricks and Reid both missed shots that could have tied or won it, and Reid's tip-in rolled off the rim with six seconds left. Aldridge grabbed the moment, took the foul, and made both free throws with three seconds left. Dayton Forsythe's final three missed, and the Lions had the win.

The guards decided it

Star to star, this game belonged to a Lion. Bo Aldridge scored a game-high 22 points on 8-of-12 shooting with five assists, and hit the two free throws that ended it. Mohamed Diakite added 15 points and seven rebounds, and Alonzo Dodd scored 15 with five 3-pointers before fouling out. Oklahoma's best answer was Isaacs, the Texas A&M transfer who scored 15 in his Sooners debut, and Reid, who posted 14 points and 10 rebounds. Three Lions matched or beat Oklahoma's top scorer — in Oklahoma's building.

Why this one goes in the record book

East Texas A&M is a Southland Conference program — the former Texas A&M–Commerce — that went 11-21 last season, was picked to finish last in its own league's preseason poll, and arrived in Norman ranked No. 294 in KenPom, per USA Today. The school had never beaten a power-conference opponent. It had never beaten Oklahoma, either: the Sooners won the two previous meetings 84-56 in 2024 and 87-59 in 1970, the AP noted. Monday flipped all of it in one night, and it snapped two Oklahoma streaks in the process — 30 consecutive non-conference wins at Lloyd Noble Center, and a run of 22 wins in 23 season openers.

Oklahoma helped beat itself

The upset needed a door, and the Sooners held it open. Oklahoma shot 17-of-32 from the free-throw line — 15 misses in a game it lost by four — committed 15 turnovers, and shot 25 percent from three. East Texas A&M outscored the Sooners 16-7 on second-chance points. Oklahoma was also without starting point guard Xzayvier Brown, its leading returning scorer, who was ruled out with a lower-body injury about an hour before tip; Brown had started all 37 games last season.

The timing could not be worse for Porter Moser. This was a roster Moser had described as the most talented of his six seasons in Norman, and USA Today noted his seat was already hot entering a make-or-break year — and that the loss projects as a Quad 4 blemish in the NET rankings that could follow Oklahoma all season. One game does not end a tenure. But an opening-night loss of this size, at home, in a buy game, gets remembered in March and in job reviews alike.

East Texas A&M heads to Rice on Thursday carrying the biggest win in school history. Oklahoma hosts Mississippi Valley State on Friday, and the Sooners' first job is simpler than any scheme: make the free ones.