Hear what Nick Collison had to say during his jersey retirement ceremony about the early days of the Thunder, Russell Westbrook and the OKC fans. OU's Lon Kruger talks about the extra juice his players have going into the NCAA basketball tournament and OSU's John Smith talks about the challenges his seniors faced during an undefeated regular season going into the start of the NCAA wrestling tournament.
Here is the tribute video the team put together for Mr. Thunder.
Nick spoke to the crowd for several minutes thanking teammates, management, staff, his family and the OKC fans.
When fans walked into The Peake it was easy to see something special would be happening...Nick Collison's name and picture were everywhere.
You could maybe say all that emotional, ceremonial stuff distracted the Thunder from the business of playing a game, but they've had terrible starts in now 11 of their last 13 games. Against Toronto they trailed by as many as 19 and were down by a dozen with just four minutes left.
That's when the unlikely happened, a 16-4 Thunder run to tie the game, capped by the Russell Westbrook layup.
But no juice for overtime and OKC lost 123-114 and now the Thunder get to play the Raptors again but this time IN Toronto tomorrow night.
Don't forget the NCAA basketball tournament gets started today, the Oklahoma Sooners won't tip until tomorrow morning. They're a team that could be capable of an opening round upset and maybe more.
And the NCAA wrestling tournament also starts today...the OSU Cowboys one of the favorites to try and stop Penn State from winning another title. Matches can be seen on ESPNU.