Oklahoma State star Abou Ousmane saw his college basketball career come to an early end at the Big 12 Tournament on Tuesday. He had to come out of the game on account of a foolish technical foul because his coaching staff failed to keep him in check.
It was an unfortunate way to conclude a well-decorated five-year career.
Ousmane, a native of Brooklyn, initially committed to play college basketball at North Texas. The 6-foot-10 forward averaged 11 points, 6.0 rebounds and 1.3 blocks per game as a junior, which allowed him to transfer up. He spent the 2023-24 season at Xavier before Oklahoma State in 2024-25.
Although the Cowboys will finish below .500 on the year, they relied on Ousmane during the games that they did win. The fifth-year senior averaged a team-high 12.5 points, with 5.4 rebounds in 22.7 minutes.
As good as he was, he was often in foul trouble and completely fell apart during the first round of the Big 12 Tournament on Tuesday. Ousmane fouled out with more than 12 minutes remaining in the second half with only four points, one rebound and one assist. That won’t get the job done!
Unfortunately, I place a large portion of the blame for his fifth and final foul on the coaching staff. It feels to me like Steve Lutz did not have control of his program throughout much of his first year at the helm, which will serve as a great lesson for the future. It was only year one! Plenty of time to get it going.
With that being said, I hate to see Abou Ousmane go out like he did and the coaching staff could’ve prevented — or at least tried to prevent — such an ending.
Oklahoma State has nine assistant coaches, not including Lutz. They allowed for Ousmane to get T’d up.
He initially picked up his fourth foul on a questionable play at the rim. Lutz took him out to prevent a fifth.
Ousmane stopped to talk with/at the official on his way back to the bench and pled his case. The official allowed him to do so. However, Ousmane circled back to the referee after he had already reached the bench to drive his point home. The official hit him with a technical foul. His career came to an end.
I don’t know how someone, anyone on the Cowboys’ coaching staff didn’t walk over to grab Abou Ousmane as soon as he started talking to the official the first time. Someone, anyone should’ve SPRINTED over to grab him and sit him back down as soon as he turned back around. Nope. They watched the whole thing unfold without an attempt to intervene. Their best player fouled out of the game with almost 14 minutes left and would, quite literally, never return. That’s on them if you ask me.