A Tale of Two Cades: As Cunningham makes his Bedlam debut, Davis is a veteran to the rivalry
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Feb. 26—Bedlam hoops won't have its usual packed house at Lloyd Noble Center on Saturday or Gallagher-Iba Arena two days after.
It will, however, have a Cade.
Two of them actually.
Neither are strangers to big moments, both can play some defense and shoot the ball well.
Both are well-loved within their respective Bedlam communities and likely loathed in the other.
Oklahoma State's Cade — Cade Cunningham — still has plenty to prove. This is after all his first foray into the Sooner State's premier basketball rivalry.
For Oklahoma's Cade? He's been here before. And the last time he was, he was special.
Of course, OU's Cade is Cade Davis, the Sooner player-turned-coach who since his final Bedlam meeting in 2011 has played nine seasons professionally overseas and returned to Norman this current OU campaign to become a graduate assistant on coach Lon Kruger's staff.
"I think that's just the natural path that the game has kind of taken me on," Davis said. "And throughout my professional playing career, that's what I kind of tried to prepare myself for the mind of wanting to be a coach and wanting to teach the game."
Walking away from his playing career wasn't easy for the Elk City native. He played 125 games for OU, averaging 8.1 points and shooting 34.1% from beyond the perimeter. His final season in Norman, Davis scored a career single-season best 14.2 points per game and shot 35.8% from 3.
From there, Davis and his wife, Mara, bounced from Macedonia to Greece, Finland, Italy, Cyprus, Belgium and finally Malaysia, where he was paid to play the game he loves and made plenty of lasting memories and friends along the way.
The couple, who met at OU, had their daughter, Zara, near the end of Cade's professional basketball career. Soon after, the COVID-19 pandemic hit in Malaysia and would follow the Davis family upon its return to the United States.
The novel virus put a halt to sports and played a part in Cade Davis' retirement. But he's carved out a valuable role on Kruger's staff as not only a coach but a mentor and ambassador for the program.
"Cade's got a great feel for what the guys are going through," Kruger said. "He's got great perspective as a former player. He's got a good knack in terms of relating and communicating with them. The value of being a Sooner. That's really important to him.
"So, how these guys are representing, how these guys are improving, Cade's just got a good knack. He's got a good feel from a coaching perspective and is going to be an outstanding coach and excited to have him on staff."
Davis is happy to be in Norman as well.
Much has changed, though, since his Sooner days.
The COVID-19 pandemic has persisted, changing the look of college basketball across the country.
When OU enters Lloyd Noble Center on Saturday, the crowd will be scattered. The same goes for when it visits Gallagher-Iba Arena in Stillwater on Monday for round two of the rivalry.
There won't be a shoulder-to-shoulder crowd waiting to attack the ear drums of players and coaches.
The Pokes' Cade won't have to deal with that either, which is a blessing for Cunningham.
The Cowboy freshman is projected to be to the 2021 NBA Draft's top pick and likely would have been the primary target to not just OU fans but every opposing crowd much like Davis' former OU teammate and the 2009 NBA Draft's No. 1 overall pick Blake Griffin.
Davis, nor his fellow Sooners, never minded the extra effort opposing arenas would put forth when OU and a potential NBA star visited.
That's to be expected in the sport.
"That kind of target on your back makes it enjoyable," Davis said. "And it's those experiences and those memories that you make in those times that really help you figure out who you are in those circumstances."
OU won't have a regular home atmosphere Saturday to throw at the other Cade but it will have its first of two chances to do what Davis did in his final Bedlam outing.
On March 5, 2011, Davis and the Sooners downed the Cowboys 64-61. Davis led OU with 22 points on 6-of-12 shooting and put the clamps on OSU sharpshooter Keiton Page in the final seconds, forcing him out of taking the Pokes' last shot, which Reger Dowell missed.
Perhaps one of Davis' pupils will shine the way he did.
Joe Buettner
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