Danny White
Winter is Coming
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From College Football News. I'll say it again... this year has been arguably Stoops' greatest coaching season yet!
Instant Analysis: Oklahoma-Oklahoma State
By Matt Zemek
Staff Columnist
Posted Nov 25, 2006
The way the Oklahoma Sooners won the latest edition of the Bedlam Series is the same way they achieved the seemingly impossible in 2006: with legendary and admirable stubbornness.
The Sooners ran, ran and ran some more in their six-point win over the feisty Cowboys of Oklahoma State. As was the case in other gut-check wins over the past month of play, the Sooners rode a gallant offensive line and a relentless Allen Patrick to power their way to productivity, while a resilient defense led by C.J. Ah You made gritty, gutsy stands to preserve a small Oklahoma advantage in the game's final, frenetic quarter. It all adds up to an improbable Big XII Southern Division championship and a date with old archrival Nebraska next weekend in Kansas City.
Sooner coach Bob Stoops might have won a national title six years ago, but if life is about more than raw results, this moment will rate as his finest hour in Norman. What Stoops and his players achieved this year ranks as one of the greatest single-season accomplishments college football has ever seen in the sport's 138-year history. At the heart of this awe-inspiring Oklahoma Autumn is a stubbornness of truly biblical proportions.
One would venture to say that in the great state of Oklahoma, a fair amount of folks know their Good Book and are aware of the meaning of its stories, particularly in the Old Testament. In that first half of the Bible are accounts that set the gold standard for stubbornness: journeys in the desert, decades in exile, years without children, trials in dens of lions, and so on. The heroes and heroines of these events are people who had to endure profound agonies and take long walks through wildnerness periods of waiting, deprivation and uncertainty.
Such was the struggle of the 2006 Oklahoma Sooners and their head coach. It was nothing if not biblical in the deepest, truest sense of the term.
Back in August, when star quarterback Rhett Bomar and heralded guard J.D. Quinn got themselves into trouble, Bob Stoops kicked them off the team in his first act of stubborn resistance to the ways of college coaches who--amidst the cutthroat economic pressures of the business--have let players slide for worse offenses in the past. Stoops' hopes of winning the Big XII South took a huge hit with that incident and his decision to bring the hammer down on his starting quarterback. How could it not? Backup Paul Thompson flatly failed as the Sooners' signal caller in the first few games of the 2005 season. There was no reason to expect things would be very different in 2006. Moreover, the loss of Quinn depleted an offensive line that had to be on its game for Adrian Peterson to be effective. Stoops was stubborn to the -nth degree, and it seemed that such stubbornness--while ethically admirable and morally noble--would sink his team's chances of winning a championship.
Speaking of Adrian Peterson, OU's collegiate equivalent of a franchise player was lost in the middle of the season due to an injury. Stoops was faced with a fundamental decision: emphasize the pass, or rededicate his team to the ground game? Once again, Stoops chose to be stubborn, and as a result, the United States learned the name of Allen Patrick while also appreciating the guts and grit of an offensive line that willed itself to excel without J.D. Quinn.
Yet, for all of the resilient Sooners' many successes, they still stood outside the candy store looking in when November 11 came across the calendar. A game behind Texas--two if you counted the head-to-head loss to the Longhorns--the Sooners seemed to have no hope of winning their division and playing for the conference title. On a more national level, the Sooners were saddled--officially, anyway (pun very much intended)--with two losses overall, due to the horrendous and criminally bad call they were dealt against Oregon on the most infamous onside kick in college football history. While Oklahoma's divisional hopes were just about done, the Sooners' prospects of an at-large BCS bowl bid were also slim to none. For all they had in fact achieved, the Sooners had little to show for it.
But then the football gods interceded, as the forces of fate rewarded Bob Stoops and his players for their biblical stubbornness.
Yes, in a story with achingly amazing and astoundingly awesome scriptural parallels, the red sea parted--pigskin style--for the Crimson and Cream. Texas lost at Kansas State on the night of November 11, while the Sooners polished off Texas Tech and then beat Baylor a week later. That evening brought a welcome series of developments to Norman, but it still didn't seem likely to lift OU to the promised land. More waiting, more stubbornness, more hoping against hope, more belief while in the deepest, darkest valley--these acts of uncommon faith and supreme stubbornness were needed for the Sooners and their fans to dream the impossible dream.
The football gods, so cruel to OU in the first half of the season, continued to make amends by ensuring that Bob Stoops and his kids were rewarded for their stubbornness.
Dennis Franchione and Texas A&M, winless in this millennium against Texas, improbably held the Longhorns to seven points in Austin on their way to an upset victory. Suddenly, the Big XII South, a chance for a conference title, and a roadmap to a BCS bowl fell within the Sooners' control. Once this Bedlam battle began, Oklahoma--newly positioned in the divisional driver's seat--showed the same stubbornness it had displayed all year long.
They overcame scandal and suspension. They surmounted injuries and injustices. They lived through a real loss against Texas and a fake loss against Oregon that should have counted as a win. They ran well, even without their best runner. They passed well, even without their best passer. They prevailed precisely when they had been written off in the chase for a Big XII championship.
From the ashes of August agony, the Oklahoma Sooners--never fully equipped, often jobbed by officiating, and continuously given every reason to cite outside factors for their demise--rose to redemptive heights by simply refusing to fold or take the easy way out of adversity. Like a stubborn mule, Oklahoma and Bob Stoops kept going directly into the thick of the fire, looking near-certain death in the eye and giving nothing less than their best shot, damn the consequences. It was a high-risk approach, even though it was the admirable one--just like everything else this team and coach have done all season long.
In the end, though, that approach has delivered Oklahoma over the abyss and through the darkness. The Sooners now bask in the brilliantly bright heavenly light of gridiron glory the likes of which few teams have ever felt in college football history. The satisfaction felt right now by a team, a coaching staff, and a fan base has to exceed normal, garden-variety levels. This wasn't just any championship won by any football team at the end of any regular season. This was a title won against all odds, obstacles, injustices, limitations and losses.
Several Oklahoma Sooner teams have won national championships, but a hundred years from now, historians of college football--particularly the OU program--will talk about the 2006 Sooners as one of the greatest teams this football power has ever seen. If the people of Oklahoma ever needed a reminder about the power of faith, their football team did what no sermon could ever hope to achieve. The example of the stubborn Sooners of oh-six will last forever in the land where the wind comes sweeping down the plain.
Instant Analysis: Oklahoma-Oklahoma State
By Matt Zemek
Staff Columnist
Posted Nov 25, 2006
The way the Oklahoma Sooners won the latest edition of the Bedlam Series is the same way they achieved the seemingly impossible in 2006: with legendary and admirable stubbornness.
The Sooners ran, ran and ran some more in their six-point win over the feisty Cowboys of Oklahoma State. As was the case in other gut-check wins over the past month of play, the Sooners rode a gallant offensive line and a relentless Allen Patrick to power their way to productivity, while a resilient defense led by C.J. Ah You made gritty, gutsy stands to preserve a small Oklahoma advantage in the game's final, frenetic quarter. It all adds up to an improbable Big XII Southern Division championship and a date with old archrival Nebraska next weekend in Kansas City.
Sooner coach Bob Stoops might have won a national title six years ago, but if life is about more than raw results, this moment will rate as his finest hour in Norman. What Stoops and his players achieved this year ranks as one of the greatest single-season accomplishments college football has ever seen in the sport's 138-year history. At the heart of this awe-inspiring Oklahoma Autumn is a stubbornness of truly biblical proportions.
One would venture to say that in the great state of Oklahoma, a fair amount of folks know their Good Book and are aware of the meaning of its stories, particularly in the Old Testament. In that first half of the Bible are accounts that set the gold standard for stubbornness: journeys in the desert, decades in exile, years without children, trials in dens of lions, and so on. The heroes and heroines of these events are people who had to endure profound agonies and take long walks through wildnerness periods of waiting, deprivation and uncertainty.
Such was the struggle of the 2006 Oklahoma Sooners and their head coach. It was nothing if not biblical in the deepest, truest sense of the term.
Back in August, when star quarterback Rhett Bomar and heralded guard J.D. Quinn got themselves into trouble, Bob Stoops kicked them off the team in his first act of stubborn resistance to the ways of college coaches who--amidst the cutthroat economic pressures of the business--have let players slide for worse offenses in the past. Stoops' hopes of winning the Big XII South took a huge hit with that incident and his decision to bring the hammer down on his starting quarterback. How could it not? Backup Paul Thompson flatly failed as the Sooners' signal caller in the first few games of the 2005 season. There was no reason to expect things would be very different in 2006. Moreover, the loss of Quinn depleted an offensive line that had to be on its game for Adrian Peterson to be effective. Stoops was stubborn to the -nth degree, and it seemed that such stubbornness--while ethically admirable and morally noble--would sink his team's chances of winning a championship.
Speaking of Adrian Peterson, OU's collegiate equivalent of a franchise player was lost in the middle of the season due to an injury. Stoops was faced with a fundamental decision: emphasize the pass, or rededicate his team to the ground game? Once again, Stoops chose to be stubborn, and as a result, the United States learned the name of Allen Patrick while also appreciating the guts and grit of an offensive line that willed itself to excel without J.D. Quinn.
Yet, for all of the resilient Sooners' many successes, they still stood outside the candy store looking in when November 11 came across the calendar. A game behind Texas--two if you counted the head-to-head loss to the Longhorns--the Sooners seemed to have no hope of winning their division and playing for the conference title. On a more national level, the Sooners were saddled--officially, anyway (pun very much intended)--with two losses overall, due to the horrendous and criminally bad call they were dealt against Oregon on the most infamous onside kick in college football history. While Oklahoma's divisional hopes were just about done, the Sooners' prospects of an at-large BCS bowl bid were also slim to none. For all they had in fact achieved, the Sooners had little to show for it.
But then the football gods interceded, as the forces of fate rewarded Bob Stoops and his players for their biblical stubbornness.
Yes, in a story with achingly amazing and astoundingly awesome scriptural parallels, the red sea parted--pigskin style--for the Crimson and Cream. Texas lost at Kansas State on the night of November 11, while the Sooners polished off Texas Tech and then beat Baylor a week later. That evening brought a welcome series of developments to Norman, but it still didn't seem likely to lift OU to the promised land. More waiting, more stubbornness, more hoping against hope, more belief while in the deepest, darkest valley--these acts of uncommon faith and supreme stubbornness were needed for the Sooners and their fans to dream the impossible dream.
The football gods, so cruel to OU in the first half of the season, continued to make amends by ensuring that Bob Stoops and his kids were rewarded for their stubbornness.
Dennis Franchione and Texas A&M, winless in this millennium against Texas, improbably held the Longhorns to seven points in Austin on their way to an upset victory. Suddenly, the Big XII South, a chance for a conference title, and a roadmap to a BCS bowl fell within the Sooners' control. Once this Bedlam battle began, Oklahoma--newly positioned in the divisional driver's seat--showed the same stubbornness it had displayed all year long.
They overcame scandal and suspension. They surmounted injuries and injustices. They lived through a real loss against Texas and a fake loss against Oregon that should have counted as a win. They ran well, even without their best runner. They passed well, even without their best passer. They prevailed precisely when they had been written off in the chase for a Big XII championship.
From the ashes of August agony, the Oklahoma Sooners--never fully equipped, often jobbed by officiating, and continuously given every reason to cite outside factors for their demise--rose to redemptive heights by simply refusing to fold or take the easy way out of adversity. Like a stubborn mule, Oklahoma and Bob Stoops kept going directly into the thick of the fire, looking near-certain death in the eye and giving nothing less than their best shot, damn the consequences. It was a high-risk approach, even though it was the admirable one--just like everything else this team and coach have done all season long.
In the end, though, that approach has delivered Oklahoma over the abyss and through the darkness. The Sooners now bask in the brilliantly bright heavenly light of gridiron glory the likes of which few teams have ever felt in college football history. The satisfaction felt right now by a team, a coaching staff, and a fan base has to exceed normal, garden-variety levels. This wasn't just any championship won by any football team at the end of any regular season. This was a title won against all odds, obstacles, injustices, limitations and losses.
Several Oklahoma Sooner teams have won national championships, but a hundred years from now, historians of college football--particularly the OU program--will talk about the 2006 Sooners as one of the greatest teams this football power has ever seen. If the people of Oklahoma ever needed a reminder about the power of faith, their football team did what no sermon could ever hope to achieve. The example of the stubborn Sooners of oh-six will last forever in the land where the wind comes sweeping down the plain.
