I don’t know whether to be amused or insulted by the reaction to my home state's embrace of its temporary NBA franchise (although I am adopting Deadspin’s NOOCH moniker). Everyone just seems so surprised about the whole thing. Is it really a surprise that a sports crazy state that lacks the population to ever have a permanent professional team would jump at this once-in-a-lifetime chance to be part of the big time for awhile?Especially at reduced ticket prices? And when said team has acquired beloved Oklahoma State alum Desmond Mason? We do enjoy good basketball, people, even if we normally only have the college variety.

Of course, there’s always the possibility that Oklahoma sports fans will do anything to forget the horrors of college football season this year. (Although, yay! Nebraska sucks worse than OU! Ha!)Perhaps the true test is whether the attendance stays high once Sutton, Sampson, and baby Sutton (and whoever the TU guy is – is it still Phillips?) trot out their nationally ranked and/or defending conference champion (except for TU, that’s why I don’t know who their coach is) squads in games that actually count. (Also, the OU women are going to rock, but I’m not dumb enough to think that will be a distraction from the NBA in most people’s minds.)

I will now stop typing, because I can’t count any of these words towards my word count goal.