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Updates on Jadon Jones, Jeff Nwankwo for OU basketball

Bob Przybyloby:Bob Przybylo•01/02/25•

BPrzybylo

Jeff Nwankwo2
OU transfer commit Jeff Nwankwo. (Photo provided from Nwankwo's Instagram).

There are a lot of impressive things about the 13-0 start for OU basketball. One of them that might go under the radar? This team hasn’t been full strength yet.

Head coach Porter Moser was certainly hoping to get contributions from Jadon Jones and/or Jeff Nwankwo this season.

But as OU enters SEC play? Still seems a ways away for either one of them.

“Yea, getting closer,” Moser told SoonerScoop on Thursday. “They’re doing some live actions now. It’s live action stuff, is the daily grind of it, to where you don’t really worry about injury because they’re legs aren’t strong enough to handle the live stuff, but they’re definitely closer. They’re in live play now.”

Jones injured his back the week before the season opener. He has not played a game this season. Nwankwo tore his Achilles in the summer. Surprisingly, Nwankwo has made tremendous progress in trying to get back for this season.

Despite both guys missing, depth hasn’t been a concern for OU. It’s actually been a strength, and a huge reason for the best start since the 1987-88 season.

Moser on OU’s fast start

“The early part of the non-conference schedule, I thought we had a lot of different guys on different nights score the ball,” Moser said. “That was encouraging to me. We went with the smaller-guard lineup a couple games in, and each one of those guys had games over 25 points. Jalon (Moore)’s had that. Sam got a 20-point game. Coaches always worry about scoring with a new team, and we’ve had different guys different nights in a lot of the games.

“The thing we’ve been able to do, is I think we’ve got some fight in us. We’ve got some resiliency in us and some belief. There’s a great chemistry in the locker room about believing. These preseason things, it just doesn’t matter to us. We know we’re facing the preseason No. 1 SEC team in Alabama. Just a ton of respect for the program and what they do. There’s an inner confidence, a confident respect I think we have, and it’s how hard we work in practice, how hard we prepare. I think that’s what you like to see, too, in this era of a lot of new guys on a new team. They’re pulling for each other.”

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