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Something I Bet You Didn’t Know About Oklahoma Football

By Chip Rouse

Nov 28, 2015; Stillwater, OK, USA; Oklahoma Sooners before the start of a game against the Oklahoma State Cowboys at Boone Pickens Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Alonzo Adams-USA TODAY Sports
Nov 28, 2015; Stillwater, OK, USA; Oklahoma Sooners before the start of a game against the Oklahoma State Cowboys at Boone Pickens Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Alonzo Adams-USA TODAY Sports /
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Of all the great stories and statistical measuring sticks that have shaped and defined the history of Oklahoma football for what amounts to 122 seasons this fall, one that is represented by the number 12 may be the most remarkable.

Aug 30, 2014; Norman, OK, USA; General view of Gaylord Family - Oklahoma Memorial Stadium during the game between the Oklahoma Sooners and Louisiana Tech Bulldogs. Mandatory Credit: Kevin Jairaj-USA TODAY Sports
Aug 30, 2014; Norman, OK, USA; General view of Gaylord Family – Oklahoma Memorial Stadium during the game between the Oklahoma Sooners and Louisiana Tech Bulldogs. Mandatory Credit: Kevin Jairaj-USA TODAY Sports /

Editor’s note: Once a week, from now until the start of the 2016 college football season, we will share with you a stat or story you may not be aware of regarding Oklahoma Sooner football.

This week, we are highlighting the number 12 and the relevance of that number in Sooner gridiron history.

Oklahoma has played a total of 1,233 games in 121 seasons of football (through the 2015 season). They have been victorious in 861 of them, seventh most in college football history. Only Michigan (925), Notre Dame (892), Texas (889), Nebraska (887), Ohio State (875) and Alabama (864) rank ahead of the Sooners in all-time wins.

Oklahoma’s 861 all-time wins (179, or 21 percent, of those have come under Bob Stoops, the winningest coach in OU’s storied history) have come over 121 college seasons.

In only 12 of this 121 seasons have the Sooners posted a losing record. Here is what makes this statistic so significant: It is the fewest number of losing seasons of any team in all of college football history.

Three of OU’s 12 losing seasons came under coach John Blake, himself a former Sooner player, in the three years immediately preceding Bob Stoops, who has not had a losing season in his 17 seasons as the Sooners’ head coach.

Bennie Owen, who coached the longest of Oklahoma’s 21 head football coaches, coached for 22 seasons. Nineteen of the 22 were winning seasons, but he did go through a three-year stretch from 1922-24 when the Sooners had consecutive losing campaigns.

Even legendary Sooner coach Bud Wilkinson, whose 1954, 1955,1956 and 1957 teams went three and a half seasons with losing a single game (47 straight), suffered a losing season. His 1960 Oklahoma team finished 3-6-1.

The worst season record in the Sooners’ illustrious football history came in 1996 in John Blake’s first season as head coach. The OU team that year won just three of 11 games.

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