No. 12 Oklahoma brings 13-0 mark into clash at No. 5 Alabama

No. 12 Oklahoma faces its stiffest test of the season to date against No. 5 Alabama on Saturday in Tuscaloosa.It’s the Southeastern Conference opener for both teams and the beginning of a sprint to March through an 18-game league schedule.There are 10 SEC teams in the AP Top 25 and five in the Top 10. Oklahoma coach Porter Moser started to lobby the NCAA Tournament selection committee members early when it comes to the grind each SEC team will face.”I don’t want to hear a narrative this year that a league can only have a certain number of teams in (the NCAA Tournament),” Moser said. “That was the narrative last year. There should be no narrative. The SEC is the best league in the country.”Look what we’ve done against everyone else in the nonconference (schedule). Every night in the SEC is going to be an elite Quad 1 game. We have 16 Quad 1 and two Quad 2 games left, come on, who else has that?”In its final tuneup before SEC play, Oklahoma (13-0) picked up an 89-67 home win against Prairie View A&M on Sunday. Jalon Moore led the Sooners with 22 points, Jeremiah Fears scored 19 and Duke Miles added 17.Fears was named SEC Freshman of the Week on Dec. 23 and leads the Sooners with 18.1 points per game.”One of the biggest takeaways for me is how well we came together,” Fears said. “We did a great job of coming together and believing in each other. We got this far, so why not just put our head down and keep working hard?”Alabama (11-2) topped South Dakota State 105-82 at home on Sunday as reserve Aden Holloway scored a game-high 26 points. Labaron Philon, who has won SEC Freshman of the Week honors twice this season, scored 21 and Mark Sears had 20.

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