Oklahoma football: Another Red River slugfest, by the numbers
By Chip Rouse
A couple more active Oklahoma football streaks fell by the wayside on a steamy Red River Showdown Saturday, but the most important one remained in tact: a second straight win over the Texas Longhorns.
The stunning upset loss to Iowa State the week before was OU’s first after four consecutive wins to begin the season and also snapped the Sooners 14-game winning streak, the longest active win streak among the 120 FBS (Football Bowl Subdivision) teams. That loss also ended Oklahoma’s 17-game win streak over Big 12 opponents.
Coming into the annual game with Texas this weekend, Baker Mayfield had thrown 185 passes without an interception. Late in the second quarter in the Red River Showdown, on his 201st pass attempt since his last interception (a year ago against West Virginia in the next to the last game of the regular season), Mayfield’s fourth-down pass inside the Texas 30-yard line fell short of the intended target and was picked off by Longhorn defensive back John Bonney, bring to an end the Sooner quarterback’s interception-free season.
Another streak that came to an end on Saturday afternoon at the Cotton Bowl was Oklahoma’s string of 15 consecutive games scoring 30 or more points, which is a school record. The Sooners came up one point short, but I’m certain they would rather have the victory over the hated Longhorns if they had to trade one for the other.
The 29-point scoring output was almost 16 points below Oklahoma’s 2017 scoring average. The last time the Sooners scored fewer than 30 points in a game was a year ago at home against Ohio State, a game won by the visitors 45-24.
Here are a dozen more compelling numbers from this year’s Red River rumble:
1.2 — Yards per carry by the Texas tailbacks on Saturday. Outside of Longhorn quarterback Sam Ehlinger, who had 122 of Texas’ 139 rushing yards in the game, the UT running backs made only 17 yards on 14 running plays.
3 — Field goals by OU placekicker Austin Seibert in Saturday’s Red River Showdown. That ties his career high in a single game (against both West Virginia and TCU in 2015).
5 — Lincoln Riley is one of five Oklahoma head coaches to beat Texas in their first season. Neither Bud Wilkinson or Bob Stoops is on that list.
6 — Oklahoma has won six of the last eight games against Texas, and is 13-9 in this annual rivalry game in the Big 12 era.
11-1 — Oklahoma’s record against unranked teams as the No. 12 team in the Associated Press Poll.
37-0 — Oklahoma’s record following a loss since the beginning of the 1999 season, Bob Stoops’ first year as the Sooners’ head coach.
54 — Jeff Badet’s 54-yard touchdown catch on Oklahoma’s fifth play of the game was the fifth longest touchdown pass against Texas in the history of the longtime series.
90 — The air temperature at kickoff in Dallas in Saturday’s Red River Showdown. The last time the temperature was that high for this game was back in 1991, when the game time temperature was 93 degrees.
112 — Saturday’s game was the 112th meeting in football between Oklahoma and Texas, the most for the Sooners against another opponent.
179 — Passing yards by Baker Mayfield in the first quarter against Texas.. That is the most by an Oklahoma quarterback in the opening quarter since 1999, when Josh Heupel was the Sooner QB.
206 — Yardage differential between Oklahoma and Texas at the end of the first quarter on Saturday. OU had 225 yards of total offense in the opening 15 minutes; Texas has 19 yards of total offense in the first quarter.
518 — Total yards of offense in OU’s 29-24 victory over Texas on Saturday. Coming into the game, Oklahoma was averaging 587 yards of total offense, No. 1 in the FBS (Football Bowl Subdivision).