NORMAN — If OU women's basketball had fear 40 days ago, it's gone now.
The Sooners have proven that repeatedly during their red-hot start in Big 12 play.
Wednesday, they put an exclamation point on it with a 66-63 win over No. 2 Kansas State at Lloyd Noble Center, further solidifying their remarkable turnaround.
"I don't think we're afraid of anything," Sooners coach Jennie Baranczyk said. "I think that the fear has left us. It's not, 'Oh no, are we going to lose a game.'"
The win was OU's first over a team ranked in the top two since knocking off then-No. 2 Texas in the 2004 Big 12 Tournament championship game.
Any fear was shook out of the Sooners in December, as they dropped four of five games, including a stunning 79-70 home defeat to Southern on Dec. 22.
"Trust in ourselves," OU senior Lexy Keys said of the biggest difference between now and a little more than a month ago.
Skylar Vann scored 10 of her 21 points in the fourth quarter for the Sooners, who held Kansas State to just 10 points in the final quarter to pull off the upset and move within a half-game of the Wildcats for the top spot in the Big 12.
Wednesday’s win was the eighth in nine games for the Sooners (14-6, 8-1 Big 12).
The Wildcats were without Ayoka Lee, who scored an NCAA-record 61 points against the Sooners in 2022 in Manhattan, Kansas. Lee has missed the last four games after undergoing surgery on her ankle in mid-January and is expected to miss at least two more weeks.
Lee suffered the injury in Kansas State’s 74-57 win over the Sooners on Jan. 10, where she scored 19 points. Lee then had 21 points and 10 rebounds in a win over Texas before it was determined she would need to undergo the surgery.
But even without Lee, the Wildcats are dangerous.
Kansas State came into the game having won 14 consecutive games —15 if you count TCU's forfeit.
The Wildcats have length that makes them hard to defend.
But after some early struggles, the Sooners adjusted.
OU had eight turnovers in the first half. They only had two after the break.
"Our offense doesn't have the flow and timing that we'd like it to have," Baranczyk said. "But I feel like our receivers are better. We're giving up position for the possession. We weren't doing that earlier."
Here are three other takeaways from the win:
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Gabby Gregory returns
After playing her first three seasons with the Sooners, Tulsa product Gabby Gregory returned to Lloyd Noble Center for the second consecutive season as a member of the Wildcats.
Gregory received a noticeable applause from OU fans in pregame introductions.
Once the game started, though, she struggled.
Gregory missed her first six shots from the field —four of them 3-pointers —before finally burying a 3-pointer in the final minute of the third quarter.
Gregory finished 1 of 8 with five points, seven rebounds and five assists.
“I thought she struggled tonight,” Kansas State coach Jeff Mittie said. “I thought she played hard. I thought she had good moments passing the ball.”
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Wildcats’ size hurts Sooners early
Early on, it looked like the Sooners might be in deep trouble.
Kansas State scored the game’s first seven points and 6-foot-3 forward Gisela Sanchez in particular was making life difficult on OU.
Sanchez scored 10 points in the game’s first five minutes.
She finished with just 18, though.
The Sooners had success the rest of the game inside, ultimately outscoring the Wildcats 28-20 in the paint and cutting an early big rebounding margin. Kansas State ultimately outrebounded OU 41-36.
“We just didn’t have an answer for Vann down low,” Mittie said. “They were really working us down lot a lot tonight.”
Sooners turn up the heat defensively
Baranczyk joked last week that her team’s defense was locked in after giving up 87 points to Texas.
But the Sooners showed just how far they’ve come defensively Wednesday.
They held Kansas State to a season-low tying 36.1% from the floor and limited the Wildcats to just 10 free-throw tries.
OU also converted Kansas State’s 17 turnovers into 16 points on the other end, outscoring the Wildcats 14-4 on the fast break.
