Oklahoma football: Five bold predictions for 2017

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NEW ORLEANS, LA – JANUARY 02: Members of the Oklahoma Sooners react after a touchdown against the Auburn Tigers during the Allstate Sugar Bowl at the Mercedes-Benz Superdome on January 2, 2017 in New Orleans, Louisiana. (Photo by Sean Gardner/Getty Images) /

The Big 12 Conference is in its 22nd year of operation, and the Oklahoma football trophy case holds 10 championship trophies, more than three times the number of any other conference school in the sport of football.

Like the Kansas Jayhawks in men’s basketball, the Sooners have been the conference’s dominant team on the gridiron.

One integral piece to all those OU football championships is missing, though, as the Sooners prepare for their first season under new head coach Lincoln Riley. All 10 of Oklahoma’s Big 12 crowns in football have come under Bob Stoops, who unexpectedly announced his retirement in early June.

The Sooners won their final 10 games in 2016, including an impressive two-touchdown postseason victory over Auburn out of the SEC in the Sugar Bowl, and are projected by most every college football preview publication as a preseason top-10 team heading into the 2017 season. But all of those projections were done under the assumption that Stoops would be back on the sidelines for his 19th season at Oklahoma.

We all now know that won’t be the case, which begs the obvious question: Will the Sooners be able to carry over and maintain the momentum they had under Stoops with their new head coach, and what immediate impact will Stoops’ departure have on the 2017 season.

The answers to those questions will be revealed this fall. In the meantime, I have some bold predictions of my own regarding the 2017 season — or, if you will, the 123rd edition of Oklahoma football:

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