Oklahoma Sports NEWS and NOTES
∗ The Sooner Athletic Conference will decide its men’s and women’s basketball tournament champions at Oklahoma City University’s Abe Lemons Arena on March 3-4, 2017.
OCU will host the Sooner Athletic Conference men’s and women’s basketball tournaments for the second time in three years. Abe Lemons Arena had been the site of the postseason basketball tournament for the nation’s premier NAIA conference in 2003, 2004, 2011 and 2015.
∗ Southern Nazarene has announced that it has added a big name to its 2016-17 men’s basketball schedule as SNU will travel to Wichita State, Nov. 29.
It will be an exhibition game for the Crimson Storm, but it will be a countable regular season game for the Shockers.
Wichita State is coming off its fifth straight NCAA Tournament appearance and its third straight Missouri Valley Conference regular season title. Under Head Coach Greg Marshall, the Shockers have won four MVC regular season titles and the 2014 MVC Tournament Championship. Wichita State also reached the Final Four in the 2012-13 season and the Sweet 16 in the 2014-15 season. It also won the 2011 NIT. Marshall is 220-81 in his career with the Shockers in nine seasons.
It will also be a homecoming for SNU Assistant Coach Ryan Mahoney who graduated from Wichita State in 2010 and served as the manager for the Shockers from 2007-10.
∗ The University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma has added McKinsey Schumpert as its lead assistant for the women’s basketball team. Schumpert will join second-year head coach Darrick Matthews on the Drover staff for the 2016-17 season.
Schumpert, a native of Anadarko, comes to USAO from Southwestern Oklahoma State University in Weatherford where she was a three-year member of the Bulldogs’ basketball team. She served as a student assistant in 2013-14 before joining the active roster her final two years.
“I am excited that McKinsey has joined our staff. She is very passionate, energetic, and knowledgeable about the game,” Matthews said. “Not only did she play at different levels, but she also comes from a coaching family, so she understands everything that is required as a coach to have a successful program.
“She also possesses great insight in the recruiting trails. She will be a great asset to our program.”
Schumpert is the daughter of Anadarko High School boys basketball coach Doug Schumpert who has won five state championships at various schools during his lengthy career. Her younger sister, Kelsey, is starting her first year coaching as a student assistant at Northwestern Oklahoma State University, Alva.