Preview: Oklahoma State welcomes Georgetown to GIA

Oklahoma State (KenPom #24) unleashed an impressive 27.5 point average margin-of-victory performance on the Barclay’s Center over Feast Week. They’ll look to bring that momentum home against a Patrick Ewing-led Georgetown (KenPom #67) on Wednesday.

---

Who: Georgetown (4-3)

Where: Gallagher-Iba Arena; Stillwater, Oklahoma

When: 7 p.m. Central; Wednesday, Dec. 4

Web Stream: ESPN+

Radio: Cowboy Radio Network / TuneIn

Live Stats: okstate.statbroadcast.com

Don’t have ESPN+ yet? Click here.

---

Injury Report:

Oklahoma State:

N/A

Georgetown:

James Akinjo - Out for Season - Dismissed

Josh Leblanc - Out for Season - Dismissed

---

Projected Starters:

Oklahoma State

Georgetown

No. 12 | Terrell Allen | G | 6-3 | Sr. | Upper Marlboro, Maryland

No. 2 | Mac McClung | G | 6-2 | So. | Gate City, Virginia

No. 4 | Jagan Mosley | G | 6-3 | Sr. | Marlboro, New Jersey

No. 1 | Jamorko Pickett | G/F | 6-8 | Jr. | Washington D.C.

No. 44 | Omer Yurtseven| C | 7-0 | Sr. | Instanbul, Turkey

The Opponent:

Photo by Mark Goldman/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

Like Coach Boynton with OSU, Georgetown is in year three under NBA Hall-of-Famer Patrick Ewing. Similarly, the Hoyas started this season with some buzz that they were headed in the right direction towards a tournament season. Following a blowout victory of Texas and a close loss to #1 Duke, it seemed like they were right on track for that.

But recent events have caused the Georgetown narrative to turn on its head.

After unexpectedly dropping a game at home to UNC Greensboro, Georgetown dismissed two of their top five scorers in starting point guard James Akinjo and key reserve Josh Leblanc for disciplinary reasons. Leblanc and two other reserves in Galen Alexander and Myron Gardner have been named in legal proceedings. It’s quite a complicated situation and I recommend following those hyperlinks if you want more details.

All that said, Georgetown is reeling a little bit on and off the court and have lost at least 20.6 ppg worth of production. This will cause the Hoyas to look a little different, and us Cowboy fans are all too familiar with player dismissals after last season. Depending on locker room dynamics, this could even end up being an addition by subtraction situation where the Hoyas come out strong and ready to put all of this behind them.

3 Things to Watch:

Focus-

Coach Mike Boynton has generally done a good job of keeping his team focused in the midst of a myriad of distractions for his tenure. His latest challenge is maintaining momentum while the Hoyas disruption could be the Pokes’ biggest distraction. The Cowboys will need to be prepared for Georgetown’s best shot in a featured match-up.

All eyes on us-

The Cowboys have garnered some real national attention and are ranked in the Coach’s Poll for the first time since the 2014-15 season and for the first time in Boynton’s tenure. The way they handle that attention will be key and we’ll see it for the first time Wednesday night.

Home court advantage?-

For some strange reason, all of the Cowboy’s best performances have come away from GIA this season. With fan momentum building, hopefully a rowdy GIA will start to reverse that trend quickly.

Cowboys Ride For Free has affiliate partnerships. These do not influence editorial content, though Cowboys Ride For Free and SB Nation may earn commissions for products purchased via affiliate links. For more information, see our guiding principles.