Are Bob Stoops and His Coaching Staff on the Hot Seat?

Fingers are pointing in every which direction after Oklahoma’s underwhelming and disturbing 1-2 start to begin the 2016 season. The man at the center of the finger-pointing and all the questions is head coach Bob Stoops.

Oklahoma is used to being a hot topic in college football conversations, but not usually for the reasons the Sooners are this season.

The term “Big Game Bob” meant something much different in Stoops’ early days as the Sooners’ head coach than it does lately. In his early years leading the Sooners, you could almost count on Oklahoma showing up big in the big games.

Nowhere was that more apparent than in 2000, Stoops’ second season at OU, when the Sooners polished off four top-five opponents in the same season. Over the next two season, Oklahoma added wins over four more teams ranked in the Associated Press top 10.

In recent years, however Big Game Bob’s Oklahoma teams have been anything but in matchups against highly ranked teams.

In 11 games in the last three seasons against teams ranked in the top 25, the Sooners have won just four. All four came last season, and three of those were against teams forced to play backup quarterbacks.

In the Sooners’ last three matchups against ranked opponents – Clemson in the College Football Playoff last season and Houston and Ohio State this season – they were soundly defeated. And that might be erring on the conservative side. The games weren’t even close after halftime, and against Ohio State last weekend, the game was virtually over midway through the second quarter, with the Buckeyes up 28-10.

The 2016 version of Oklahoma football clearly is not your father’s Sooners, or even your grandfather’s. Heck, they aren’t even as good, or so it would appear after the first three 2016 encounters – as last year’s team, which finished fifth in the final AP rankings and began this season with even higher expectations.

As has been pointed out numerous time already this season, the previous four times Oklahoma has been ranked in the top five to begin the season in the Bob Stoops era, the Sooners have failed to live up to the lofty expectations, never finishing higher than 15th in the final rankings and twice dropping completely out of the top 25.

Sadly for Sooner fans, it’s looking more and more like you can now make it a fifth straight time that fate has befallen and OU football team.

The bullets were flying from reporters in Oklahoma’s postgame press conference after Saturday’s Ohio State game, and Stoops was quick to step right out in front of them, right square in the line of fire.

"“An outstanding team really beat the heck out of us,” the Sooner head coach acknowledged. “Our football team – I take full responsibility – was not near good enough in a big game…We just need to play better in a bunch of areas…“That’s my fault, and us as coaches. All of us together weren’t near good enough, and we’ve got a lot of work to do if we’re going to have any chance of (finishing the season strong and) winning the Big 12.”"

So the boo birds are out in full force, again, raising the recurring question that always bubbles to the surface when times are less than grand in the Sooner Nation of whether Stoops’ time at Oklahoma is nearing the end.

To those seemingly lost souls who fall in that camp, I say, “Get real!”

First of all, it’s way too early in the season to be throwing in the towel. Yes, Oklahoma has lost two of its first three games, but let’s put those losses into proper perspective. One or both of those two teams (Ohio State and Houston) could easily end up in the College Football Playoff as season’s end. They are arguably two of the best teams in the country this season.

Yes, the Sooners should have been more competitive in the two losses, but what’s to say they won’t rebound from this and run the table over the remaining nine games. That would result in a 10th Big 12 championship in 18 seasons under coach Stoops. Certainly nothing to sniff your nose at.

Stoops is the winningest coach in Oklahoma football history, and believe me, that is saying something when you talk about a program that has won more games (618) since 1946, or the end of World War II, than any other team in college football and has been ranked No. 1 more times than any school except Ohio State.

Entering his 18th season at OU, Stoops is within four seasons of becoming the longest-tenured head coach in the school’s history. He has failed to win as many as eight games just once at Oklahoma, and has reached 11 or more wins 11 times in 18 seasons, a success ratio attained by very few head coaches in the country.

Every time the Sooners seemingly take a step back, which has been few and far between under Stoop’s leadership, there are those who are ready to run him out of town. A ludicrous notion at best.

Every college head coach, whether its voluntary or involuntary, has a life cycle with a beginning and an end. Stoops, by his own admission, has not reached the end at Oklahoma, and Sooner fans should be grateful for that.

This is not to say, however, that there won’t or shouldn’t be a shakeup among the OU assistant coaches should the season continue down the rocky path that its currently on.

There is already a precedent by Bob Stoops of making changes in his coaching staff when the circumstances warrant it.

A Youngstown, Ohio, native and growing up a huge fan of Big Ten football (Michigan was actually the team he liked the most, not his home state Buckeyes), Stoops has had multiple opportunities to leave Oklahoma, but he is happy where he is. And Sooner fans and the University of Oklahoma have benefited greatly from that decision.

Stoops is one of the most respected and successful college coaches in the business, and could probably have any open job he wanted in the college game, but he knows there are very few jobs that could top his experience or are more prestigious than the one he holds at Oklahoma.

Why on earth would anyone contemplate running him out of town just three games into the 2016 season? Who would you find or get to replace him that would produce equal or better success? Nick Saban isn’t coming to Oklahoma. Nor is Urban Meyer, Dabo Sweeney or Jim Harbaugh?

Bob Stoops is not Joe Paterno, and not even Bobby Bowden. He’s not going to stick around at Oklahoma for another 20 years. He’ll know when it’s time to get out. We’ll know it when he knows it, but now is not the time.

To the small anti-Stoops advocacy group and anyone else foolish enough to think this way, I implore you: Be careful what you wish for.