Oklahoma football: Sooners involved in 3 of Big 12’s 5 biggest games in 2017, says one expert

It may be hard to believe, but we are under 100 days away from the start of the season many fans consider the best of the entire sports calendar. And for those teams that have much in the way of talent, resources and reputation, like Oklahoma football, much is naturally expected.

If the way-too-early and post-spring college pollsters are to be believed, the Sooners will begin the 2017 season as one of the nation’s top-10 teams. As such, Oklahoma can expect to get the best shot from every team it faces in the coming season.

But to be perfectly honest, it doesn’t really matter where the Sooners are ranked – or even if they are ranked – by reputation alone, Oklahoma will always get the full attention and motivation of every opponent it faces. And that combination generally makes for fan interest and must-see viewing.

One college football insider, Mitch Sherman, who writes for ESPN, suggests that the Big 12, once widely believed to be one of the two best football leagues among the Power 5 conferences. cannot afford to be left out of the 2017 College Football Playoff, as it has for two of the last three seasons.

With that it mind, there are as many as a dozen Big 12 games – which, not coincidentally, is the number of regular-season games every Big 12 will play in 2017 – that could have a discernible impact on the conference race and how the Big 12 champion is viewed at season’s end by the CFP selection committee.

As the consensus preseason favorite to win a third consecutive Big 12 championship, Oklahoma, not surprisingly, is involved in more than a few of those so-called high-stake games in the coming season.

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To begin with, in 2017, for the first time since the 2010 season, the Big 12 will hold a conference championship game, which is something that at the very least will put the Big 12 champion on an even playing field with the other major conferences as far as the selection committee is concerned. The absence of a conference championship game has been a central point of controversy working against the Big 12 champion in the three years the College Football Playoff has been in existence.

It goes without saying that the newly reinstated Big 12 championship game will be one of the biggest, if not the biggest, games of the 2017 season. To get to that point, however, a number of games stand out as bigger than most and – again, not surprisingly – the Sooners of Oklahoma show up multiple times.

Sherman has identified five regular-season games in the Big 12 next season that he believes hold the biggest impact on how the Big 12 will be viewed in the Playoff conversation. Here are the five games and how he ranks them:

5. Texas at USC, September 16

4. TCU at Oklahoma, November 11

3. Oklahoma State at West Virginia, October 28

2. Oklahoma at Oklahoma State, November 4

1. Oklahoma at Ohio State, September 9

I don’t think many fans will disagree that the Oklahoma-Ohio State game could be the biggest game in all of college football next season. Because it is so early in the season, it will not necessarily result in a knockout punch for the loser, but the outcome will clearly put the winner in excellent position for the rest of the season with a high-quality win already under its belt.

TCU has always given the Sooners trouble, regardless of where the game is played. The Horned Frogs are one of the very few teams inside or outside of the Big 12 who have won four or more times in Norman. Four TCU’s five wins all-time against the Sooners have been at Owen Field.

Another factor that could affect Oklahoma’s performance when the Horned Frogs come to Norman on Nov. 11 is the fact that it follows on the heels of Bedlam the week before, the annual rivalry battle with Oklahoma State. And in 2017, Oklahoma State is the home team. In recent seasons, this rivalry has been played on the final weekend of the regular season, and the outcome has determined the Big 12 champion.

This coming season, Bedlam will be played in midseason, and there is a good chance these same two teams will collide again late in the season in a second Bedlam game – the Big 12 Championship. That second potential Bedlam matchup – surprise, surprise – would again determine the conference champion.

Another critical juncture in the upcoming Oklahoma football season is the two-game stretch over the seven days between Oct. 14 and 21. The annual Red River Showdown with Texas is Oct. 14, and the very next weekend, the Sooners travel to Manhattan, Kan., easily one of the most difficult road stops in the Big 12.

Texas is expected to be much improved under first-year coach Tom Herman and with sophomore quarterback Shane Buechele having a year of experience under his belt. The Red River rivalry is an emotionally charged contest that takes a lot out of both teams, both physically and mentally, which is exactly why the trip to Kansas State, another Big 12 team that should be better next season,  looms as a huge trap game for the Sooners.

What we are getting around to here is that at least eight of Oklahoma’s 12 regular-season games next season have some kind of criticality associated with them, either because they are on the road or at home against top-tier Big 12 teams.

And don’t discount completely the so-called gimme games against the likes of the University of Texas-El Paso (the season opener for the Sooners, but with all eyes focused on Ohio State the week after), Tulane (with a potential letdown either way the week immediately after the Ohio State game), Iowa State and Kansas (a team that beat Texas a year ago, and expected to be better this season).

Next: Time set for marquee matchup between Sooners and Ohio State

All good reason for Sooner fans to approach the coming season with cautious optimism, taken one week at a time, and trust in the adage that good things happen to good teams..