Calm down, Oklahoma’s not on the NCAA Tournament bubble yet

Oklahoma’s struggling, but it’s too early to suggest they’re on the NCAA Tournament bubble.

To say the Oklahoma Sooners are in a free fall might be an understatement. Once pegged as a preliminary top-four seed for the NCAA Tournament by the Selection Committee less than two weeks ago, Oklahoma is in shambles.

After a 30-point blowout at Kansas on Monday night in which they looked disinterested and beyond out of sorts, the Sooners are now losers of their last six games and nine of their last 11. They’ve fallen to 6-9 in the Big 12 with hopes of only evening out their conference record ahead of postseason play.

Most importantly, from an on-the-floor perspective, Trae Young has run into a brick wall. Whether it’s a cold streak, conditioning and fatigue or just a mental blockade, the country’s leader in points and assists per game isn’t playing at the National Player of the Year levels he was back in December.

Still, any talk of Oklahoma missing out on the NCAA Tournament entirely is premature. The Sooners’ NCAA Tournament resume didn’t reset at the start of conference play. Nor did it reset at the beginning of February. Their full body of work matters.

To date, Oklahoma’s put together a pretty good resume! The Sooners own six Quadrant 1 wins — victories over RPI top 30 teams at home, top 50 teams on a neutral floor and top 70 teams on the road — which are the new standard for quality wins, according to the Selection Committee. Think of it as the old RPI top 50 wins metric, but with the recognition that winning at home is easier than winning on the road.

Whether RPI top 50 wins or Quadrant 1 wins, the Selection Committee remains rather consistent in seeking out the answer to one question. Which college basketball teams have most often proven themselves capable of beating other good teams?

That’s the challenge. And February’s games count the same as November’s.

The Committee has made these things clear. When it released a preliminary list of the top 16 seeds for the Bracket Preview, both Kansas and Oklahoma were seeded higher than expected on the strength of their wins.

Now, here’s the exhaustive list of teams with as many or more quality wins as the Sooners:

• Alabama
• Auburn
• Florida
• Houston
• Kansas
• LSU
• North Carolina
• Purdue
• Texas A&M
• Villanova
• Virginia
• Xavier

Ten teams. That’s it. Certainly, none of this means Oklahoma is locked into a spot in the field. The risk for the Sooners is a lack of improvement. That a slew of teams with five Quadrant 1 wins win more big games. Then, things get dicey as other resumes start to stack up.

Next: 5 things to know as we head toward March

Oklahoma’s opportunities to rack up quality wins are running dry, too. The Sooners will have a chance to pick up a Quadrant 2 win when Kansas State comes to Norman on Saturday and they’ll need to avoid a bad loss to Iowa State at home in the final game of the season. Sandwiched in between those two contests is a road trip to Baylor — Oklahoma’s last remaining chance to lock up another Quadrant 1 win before the Big 12 conference tournament. Win that one and we can put all the resume talk to bed.

For now, though, the Sooners remain in the field. Their resume is simply too good in spite of recent struggles. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.