Texas Tech basketball: Players we are happy to see leave the Big 12

Oklahoma: Kristian Doolittle

When compiling this list, there were two Sooners who I hoped were headed off to new destinations, Brady Manek and Austin Reaves.  But alas, both are set to return for their senior seasons in Norman.  But then, I realized for the first time that neither led Oklahoma in scoring this season.  That distinction went to Kristian Doolittle, who has exhausted his eligibility.

The 6-foot-7 forward was one of those players who often put up quiet stats.  In other words, you could look at the box score at the end of the game and not realize that he’d just hung 17 points on your team because most of them came in unspectacular ways.

After all, I never would have guessed that this year he averaged 15.8 points and 8.9 rebounds per game.  Both stats would have led Tech by a considerable margin.

He had one good game against the Red Raiders in 2019-20, a 19-point, 7-rebound, 3-steal performance in OU’s lopsided victory in Oklahoma City.  When the Sooners came to Lubbock this year, he scored just eight points but did grab 11 boards.

In fact, one reason Tech fans may not have realized how good Doolittle was is that he had only two double-digit scoring performances against the Red Raiders.  Over the course of eight meetings with Tech, he averaged just 8.7 points per game, nearly two points below his career scoring average.

But even if Doolittle didn’t really kill Tech, we should be happy to see him go because it will mean we no longer have to be told five times per game that he and Manek played high school basketball together, a run-of-the-mill fact that seemed to fascinate broadcasters far more than it should have.

Indeed, OU was a three-man team this year with Doolittle, Manek, and Reaves all averaging at least 14 points per game.  Taking the leading scorer out of that equation will be significant for the Sooners.