OU vs. Texas: A stroll through some notable numbers in Red River rivalry history
By Chip Rouse
The annual Red River rivalry between Oklahoma and Texas is much more than a football border war.
It is a full-fledged event that serves as a headline attraction every year at the Texas State Fair in Dallas.
All roads leading north and south toward Dallas in the 24-to-48 hours before game time are packed with endless streaming lines of motorized vehicles carrying passionate fans and noticeable markings proudly declaring their diehard allegiance.
It can only mean OU-Texas weekend, and if you don’t believe it is a big-time event, try getting a hotel room, or even a dinner reservation, in Dallas on the same weekend as the Red River Showdown.
On Saturday, approximately 90,000 fans will descend on Fair Park, southeast of downtown Dallas and site of the State Fair of Texas as well as the Cotton Bowl, to attend the 117th renewal of the football grudge match between the University of Oklahoma and the University of Texas.
It is one of the only college football rivalry games in which the stadium is equally divided, with half of the stadium sporting the crimson colors of Oklahoma and the other half fully adorned in burnt orange, the school color of the Longhorns. It is truly a striking sight to witness in person.
This is the 90th consecutive year the annual OU-Texas rivalry game, known now as the Red River Showdown, has been played in Dallas. Before the game was permanently moved to Dallas, which just happens to be approximately halfway between Norman and Austin, where the two campuses are located, it was hosted by the two schools.
The game was played in Austin 10 times and in Houston once between 1900 and 1923, and OU was the home team on 6 occasions during that time frame, including three times when the game was played in Oklahoma City.
Here are some other notable numbers from the OU-Texas Red River Showdown football series:
3 – Number of trophies that are exchanged pending the outcome of each game in the series: the Golden Hat, a gold, 10-gallon-style hat awarded to the winning team and placed on display in the winning team’s athletic department; the Governors’ Trophy, exchanged between the governors of the two states, and the Red River Rivalry Trophy, the newest of the three awards, exchanged between the student governments of the two schools.
8 – Consecutive wins by Texas over Oklahoma between 1940 and 1947, the most by either team in the long history of the rivalry. That was followed by the Sooners winning nine of the next 10 games in the series under head coach Bud Wilkinson.
48 – Total points scored by Texas in the six games with Oklahoma from 1952 to 1957. The Sooners’ combined points in winning all six games was 168.
50 – Oklahoma has scored 50 or more points four times against Texas five times since the 2000 season. The Sooners scored that many points only one other time in the OU-Texas games before the 2000 season.
62 – Wins by Texas in the all-time series with Oklahoma. The Longhorns lead the overall series with a record of 62-49-5.
65 – Points scored by Oklahoma in defeating Texas 65-13 in 2003. That is the most points scored by either team in the history of the series.
75 – Total number of games in the OU-Texas rivalry since 1945, or post-World War II. From 1945-2020, Oklahoma has won 38 times, Texas 34 times and 3 games have ended in a tie.
1900 – The year of the inaugural game in this historic rivalry, won by Texas 28-2.
1963 – That year the game featured No. 1 Oklahoma vs. No. 2 Texas, one of only two times in the 110-year history of the series that the Sooners and Longhorns were the top two teams in the country at the time the game was played. Texas won the 1963 game 28-7 and took over the top spot in the Associated Press poll, which it held on to for the remainder of the season. In 1984, Texas entered the game as the nation’s top-ranked team, and the Sooners were No. 2. That game ended in a no-decision. The final score was 15-15. Also of note, former Texas coach Mack Brown was on the OU sidelines for the 1984 game. He was the Sooners’ offensive coordinator that season under Barry Switzer.