NCAA MEN’S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP : It’s Not Easy to Get Inside Sooners : King and Grant Take Oklahoma Long Way in a Hurry

It was time to talk about the enormity of the event, about the thrill of playing for the national college basketball championship and the specialness of it all.

Which is why Harvey Grant leaned over his microphone Sunday to speak to his waiting audience, the cameras rolling and pens poised.

“It’s no big thrill,” Grant deadpanned.

There may be a time for seriousness on this Oklahoma team, but it has yet to be seen other than in the ruthlessness the Sooners show on the court.

Waiting for their game against Kansas tonight, Grant and Stacey King, Oklahoma’s one-two inside punch, were anything but serious Sunday.

“We start getting tense and really serious--that might affect our game,” King said.

King and Grant were intent enough in their semifinal game Saturday night, taking apart an Arizona defense that was much-ballyhooed after it controlled North Carolina’s J.R. Reid in the National Collegiate Athletic Assn. West Regional final. There was nothing doing against Oklahoma, though, and the Sooners left behind an Arizona team that was amazed by the quick-shooting athleticism of King and Grant.

Next up, Kansas. But unlike the Arizona players, Danny Manning and Chris Piper--the Jayhawks’ inside defenders--know what to expect.

“I know they’ll be loose,” Piper said. “They’re always loose.”

As evidence, Grant took time Sunday to calmly explain what he enjoys in life.

“Personally, I love knocking people out,” Grant said, referring to Oklahoma’s much-noted propensity for running up a score.

The difficulty in defending King, said Piper, who will guard him, lies largely in that once he gets the ball inside, the cause is well on the road to being lost.

“You try to get some help from the weak side, but he just goes up over you,” said Piper, who at 6 feet 8 inches and 200 pounds, has a bit of difficulty matching up with King, a 6-10, 230-pound junior.

Kansas will need its guards to pressure the pass, Piper said, while he tries to front King, to prevent him from getting the ball when and where he wants it.

In the Jayhawks’ first two games against Oklahoma this season--both losses--it was King who hurt them most.

King has been a great surprise for the Sooners this season, emerging as one of the country’s top players. After averaging just 7 points a game last season, he became Oklahoma’s leading scorer this season, averaging 22.4 a game, and blocked 101 shots.

King and Grant, a 6-8 senior and a more proven player, have combined to become at least as good as any inside tandem in the country this season.

Despite their great success, neither had it so good until recently.

King, who is from Lawton, Okla., still recalls how folks around town said he would never make it at Oklahoma when he came out of high school.

“I was a little frail, 185-pound 6-8 senior,” King said. “They said I wasn’t gonna make it. Now everybody in my hometown says, ‘We knew you could do it.’ ”

King’s debut at Oklahoma was nothing to brag about. He became academically ineligible during his freshman year. The reason, he wants it made clear, wasn’t his ability.

“It wasn’t like I flunked, I just didn’t go to class. Sunny days, I was there, but soon as winter came, old Jack Frost was nipping at my toes and I stayed in the bed.”

Understanding his mistake, King said he went to class thereafter and has since made the dean’s list.

As recently as last year, King was still unhappy with his playing time at Oklahoma. He didn’t like to wait.

“I’m an impatient person. I like to get everything done fast, whether it’s winning or driving a car to Lawton.”

No wonder he fits in so well.

Grant’s road to Oklahoma wasn’t straight. He began his career at Clemson, playing on the same team as his brother, Horace, who now is playing for the Chicago Bulls in the National Basketball Assn.

But Horace had more immediate success than Harvey, who was a redshirt. Before long, he transferred to Independence (Kan.) Junior College. Watching his twin succeed was just too painful.

“I was happy for him, but it was very difficult to see him play and know I had the same ability,” Grant said.

After making first-team community-college All-American, Grant had plenty of offers. And since he didn’t like to say no, he kept saying yes.

“He’s such a nice person, he doesn’t want to tell you no,” Coach Billy Tubbs said. “He’d rather tell you yes to make you happy, even if he didn’t want to go.”

Among the schools he said yes to, Grant said, were Georgia State, Kentucky and UNLV.

“I was signing with a lot of people back then,” he said.

But the commitment he ultimately made was to Oklahoma, obviously, and it is one that has put him in a position to win a championship, something he had never done before he became a Sooner.

“Since I’ve been playing basketball, I’ve never won no kind of championship,” Grant said. “Winning the Big Eight, that was a big thrill for me.”

King, his bad times not too far in the past, still remembers what Tubbs said to him on a trip last year.

“He told me, ‘Your time in the sun is coming. You just make sure you have your sunglasses on; it’s gonna be bright.’ ”