Curing the Sooners' ennui
In 2002, the Oklahoma Sooners hosted three opponents ranked inside the top 25 at the time they entered Owen Field. Two seasons removed from winning a national championship, OU spent most of the year ranked near the top of polls and BCS standings. The three visiting squads – No. 9 Iowa State, No. 13 Colorado and No. 24 Texas Tech – were all seen as credible threats to put an end to OU’s hopes for another national crown.
Those Sooners eventually fell short of contending for a national championship. The Cyclones, Buffaloes and Red Raiders had nothing to do with it, though. OU beat them by a combined score of 136-29.
Since then, the Sooners have hosted three ranked teams in one season twice: 2008 and 2013. Top 10 opponents visiting Norman? Also rare. From the 2003 season until now, OU has played six games against teams in Norman ranked 10 or better at kickoff:
2008 - No. 2 Texas Tech
2012 - No. 5 Notre Dame
2013 - No. 10 Texas Tech
2016 - No. 3 Ohio State and No. 10 Oklahoma State
2017 - No. 6 TCU
This isn’t about dumping on the Big 12, which has supplied the majority of the Sooners’ games for nearly three decades. The league had a stupendous run in the early 2000s and remains at the forefront of innovation in the sport today.
It’s also not a complaint about how the OU athletic department has traditionally scheduled its non-conference games. The Sooners play enough quality teams outside their conference.
WARNING: First-world problems of the highest order incoming.
But the paucity of marquee opponents in Norman over the years reflects a larger issue for OU: The Big 12 hasn’t offered the Sooners many Big Games, period.
We’re talking about the games that fans anticipate for months in advance. The games that keep players sharp during the season. The games that coaches zero in on as motivation when summer workouts are dragging.
The Big 12 has plenty of good teams, but how often has anyone looked in the spring at OU’s upcoming schedule and circled a matchup that has the makings of a banger?
Now think about it from the perspective of every other team in the Big 12. Since 1999, OU has notched more victories than any other FBS program, 262 – an average of 10.5 wins per year. The program dominated the Big 12 during that period, bringing home 13 outright conference titles. That success over 25 years made it the league’s standard-bearer.
Every game the Sooners played in the Big 12 qualified as a Big Game for the team on the opposite sideline as a result. Not to mention, wins over Oklahoma bolstered the profiles of many coaches in the Big 12 over the years. The correlation between upsetting the Sooners and the opposing coach earning a contract extension is probably high for a reason: Les Miles, Chris Klieman, Matt Campbell, Lance Leipold, Mike Sherman, Dave Aranda, Art Briles.
Sure, as we’re reminded constantly by conference shills, life is going to be harder for the Sooners now as they move to the SEC. The week-to-week parade of opponents will have more resources and better talent from top to bottom across their rosters than what OU has seen in the past. Their peers will punish the Sooners on the field if OU’s commitment to competing falls off.
But that is “harder” in a different – and a more tangible – way.
The truth is that OU has been playing to avoid disappointment almost every time the squad took the field. That happens when you’re expected to win all the time, but ennui doesn’t lend itself to high performance. Well-prepared, resourceful opponents can take advantage of disinterest, which was a lesson the Sooners learned repeatedly.
That’s a psychological challenge in and of itself. Yet, no matter how often the Kansas States and Baylors snuck up on unfocused OU teams, you could count on it happening again the next year.
In theory, playing more Big Games as a member of the SEC should force OU to stay sharp throughout the entire course of the season. If a “harder” existence means less going through the motions, the Sooners should be even more competitive on the national stage in the long run.