Defense not enough for OSU to continue NIT run

Boynton said conversations will begin soon.

Braden Bush Assistant Sports Editor

March is over for the Cowboys.

The Cowboys lost in overtime to North Texas, 65-59, in the NIT Quarterfinals in Gallagher-Iba Arena on Tuesday night, ending OSU’s season.

Here are some notes from the Cowboys’ loss.

Sometimes defense doesn’t win championships

OSU set the pace on the first possession.

North Texas won the tip, and the Cowboys did what they do best. Defense.

Thirty-two seconds into the game, OSU guard Bryce Thompson blocked Moulaye Sissoko’s layup attempt with a second left on the shot clock, sending it out of bounds as the buzzer sounded. OSU forced two more shot clock violations before halftime.

“I thought our defense was excellent,” OSU coach Mike Boynton said. “Pretty decent.”

But that wasn’t enough. Not when the Cowboys scored 17 first-half points – the lowest total in a half since they scored 14 in the second half against West Virginia on Feb. 18, 2020.

OSU’s offense improved in the second half, besting its first-half total with 18 points in the second half’s first five minutes. But the Cowboys couldn’t shake the offensive problems for long, and the defense couldn’t save them.

Once in overtime, OSU scored just four points – all free throws – and went 0 for 7 from the field and 0 for 5 from behind the arc. Meanwhile, with the game tied at 58 in OT, Mean Green guard Tylor Perry made a contested 3 from the NIT logo as the shot clock expired.

“A lot of times they just made a tougher shot,” Thompson said. “It wasn’t necessarily bad defense, but a lot of times we were there and sometimes it just goes in. That’s where you’ve just got to give credit to them.”

Decisions to make

With the season over, the future of Cowboy players is here. There are no more games to look ahead to, and decisions will be made. Boynton said after some time off, conversations with players will start quickly.

“Each person’s conversation is a little bit different because their options are a little more different,” Boynton said.

John-Michael Wright, a guard with a year of eligibility remaining, is one of those players. After just one season in Stillwater, Wright has the option to return or transfer again.

“I’ve enjoyed (my time here),” Wright said. “Sad that it’s come to an end so quickly, but I made a lot of good friends in my teammates, met a lot of good people at this university, had a lot of fun while we was doing it.”

Wright said he hasn’t made a decision yet, but he has personal goals. After all, in four years of college ball, he has yet to play in the NCAA Tournament.

“I wanted to go to March Madness,” Wright said. “That’s something that I want to be able to say I experienced in my college career. So, I’m thankful that I still have an opportunity to do that. We still have a lot of guys who could come back. So, we’ll just have to see what happens.”

Tylor Perry’s homecoming

When Perry’s overtime 3 splashed in, part of Oklahoma cheered.

Perry is a junior from Fort Coffee, a small town in eastern Oklahoma, and he attended Spiro High School. As an Oklahoma native, this game felt bigger to him.

“I never thought four years ago I would be in this position, playing in front of these fans in this gym,” Perry said. “This is for those kids (back home).

“Got a little home cooking. Glad to be back. Had my family down, and I really didn’t want to lose in front of them.”

Perry, the Conference USA Player of the Year, scored a game-high 23 points.

“Tonight, he carried his team like the MVP of a conference should, and my hat’s off to him,” Boynton said.

Gen Z...

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His job as a salesman paid well, but it required him to “just work, work, work, even on Sundays. It was not worth it,” Olson said. “I was so excited to be out of that job.”

With his construction job, he said, he can spend time with his wife.

Sara Beth Ryther, 32, who joined Trader Joe’s Minneapolis store 19 month ago, sees co-workers and acquaintances who work for other retailers leave all the time.

“People are job hopping because of one or two benefits they see at another retailer,” Brown said. “I see people get sick of the low pay or how they were treated and look at another retailer and think the grass is greener.”

The 350,000-member Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) found other triggers can make young workers leave.

Nearly 70% of those who work remotely said in a SHRM survey they would look for another job before returning to the office full time.

“If you are young, that number jumps to 79%,” said SHRM Chief Human Resource Officer Jim Link. “Is that not incredible?”

Younger workers, he said, aren’t fazed by big tech company layoffs or rumors about a recession.

“While the layoffs are grabbing headlines in the market place and prompting worry, it’s not what is happening in greater America,” he said.

In Minnesota, for example, unemployment is just 2.9%, and companies are scrambling to fill open positions.

“Labor availability is still tight,” making labor shortages the second biggest concern for the 530 firms surveyed recently by the Minneapolis

Federal Reserve Bank, said the bank’s outreach director, Ron Wirtz.

Nationwide, 3.9 million Americans quit jobs in January, causing companies to boost wages, add retention bonuses and offer free training, remote work options and free food. “Employers start with increased wages and flexibility and then bring on a smorgasbord of other efforts,” Wirtz said.

With inflation, higher interest rates and soaring grocery prices, “we have economic headwinds in front of us, but the labor market is still very vigorous and very strong … and younger workers appear to be bound and determined to find as much agility as they can in their workplace,” Link said.

In looking for other jobs, young workers want psychological safety. “They want a purpose fit, fulfillment and the right culture,” one where they can speak their minds without fear of being fired or ostracized, said Jessica sports.ed@ocolly.com

Kriegel, chief scientist of workplace culture at the firm Culture Partners.

The persistence of that finding should be a wake-up call for employers already battling high turnover and labor shortages.

That juggling act helps retain some workers but strains others.

Human resource pros are burning out and joining Gen Z-ers in the hunt for other jobs, Robert Half’s Carlson said. For three years, HR workers have been “on the front lines” of labor shortages, and some have simply had enough.

With the pandemic “HR (departments) needed more help but were the last to get it because their companies focused instead on supply chain issues, not the communication and the heavy lifting needed to change the policies of going remote” while keeping and attracting talent,” Carlson said, adding that it’s the next trend to watch.