Nov. 8—After just under 11 months of waiting and anticipation, eight seconds was all it took for Oklahoma to flash it’s potential this season.

Oklahoma won the opening tip of Monday’s season opener against Oral Roberts and the ball ended up in the hands of redshirt senior Ana Llanusa.

The shooting guard from Choctaw played 24 minutes in the Sooners’ exhibition game against Emporia State on Thursday, but hasn’t seen the floor since going down with a leg injury last December.

Llanusa took the ball down the right wing and quickly fired a pass inside to Madi Williams, who was cutting towards the basket for an easy layup.

Oklahoma would go on to put up a program-record 38 points in the first quarter and ride a dominant first half to a 105-94 win over the Golden Eagles.

“We’ve played a lot of basketball together,” Williams said about Llanusa. “I think us just in general, the whole team. We all have that chemistry where we’re setting each other up. We know what our strengths are and we play to those.”

The Sooners’ season opener can’t be judged on the final score alone.

Despite leaving the Lloyd Noble Center with an 11-point win, the Sooners took control of the game early and never let the Golden Eagles get close enough to be threatening. Oklahoma set a program-record for assists in the first half with 19, and had a 67-37 lead going into halftime.

The Sooners shot 60.5% from the floor in the first two quarters and were led by 11 points from both Madi Williams and Nevaeh Tot. Still, the biggest addition to the Sooners’ offense came from Llanusa, who finished the first half with eight points on three of seven shooting and three assists.

The scoring slowed down for both teams to start the second half as neither team was able to shoot over 30% from the floor. The Golden Eagles started to find some momentum in the fourth quarter behind 60% shooting from the field and a 13-7 advantage in rebounding.

The Sooners’ lead, which made it as high as 33 at one point, shrunk all the way to 11 with a 3-pointer by Ruthie Udoumoh in the final minute of the game. The Golden Eagles went to the line 16 times in the second half and knocked down 17 of their 24 attempts on the day.

“I thought we did a great job in the first half,” OU head coach Jennie Baranczyk said. “We didn’t foul, in the second half we fouled. We opened up the third quarter and we had quite a few back-to-back-to-back-to-back fouls. They got to the line and that kind of split the momentum down and that’s what they want.”

Llanusa finished her first game back with 13 points on five of 12 shooting, two rebounds and four assists. A slow stretch during the third quarter threw off a promising start for the playmaking shooting guard, but her impact was still hard to ignore.

Williams led all scorers with 19 points on 7-12 shooting. Skylar Vann added 18 points on 8-15 shooting and added eight rebounds.

Even in a record-breaking first half it was a quiet night for sharp-shooting guard Taylor Robertson.

The redshirt senior only took three shots through the first two quarters before finishing with 13 points on four of six shooting and five rebounds.

“I think Madi set the tone for us in the first half,” Baranczyk said. “I think just her aggressiveness, her ability to be able to post up off the bounce, be able to stretch the floor. You have to respect her at every level and I think she really set the tone going north and south in that first half.”

Oklahoma improves to 1-0 with the win and will be back at home on Friday to face SMU at 10:30 a.m.