Most of the college football preseason win-total oddsmakers have the 2019 edition of Oklahoma football at 10 to 10.5 wins.
That projects to one to two losses in the coming season, which most fans would considers a championship-caliber season. But Sooner fans aren’t like most college football fans. They want and expect more, and they have good reason to feel that way, and a record to stand on that speaks for itself.
Bill Parcell’s former NFL coach and Super Bowl winner, liked to say: “You are what your record says you are.” And the Oklahoma football record has made a bold statement over the past couple of decades.
Oklahoma has a combined record of 214-52 over the last 20 seasons, 16 of which have ended with 11 or more wins. In his two seasons as head coach, Lincoln Riley’s Sooners have produced back-to-back 12-2 seasons.
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This year’s OU team should be as good, and perhaps even better, than the last two Oklahoma teams. Yes, that is the perspective of a self-confessed homey. But the fact is, the way the schedule sets up, the Sooners have a good chance of running the table, and I don’t see them losing more than once, if at all, in the regular season.
Last year we introduced the concept of “most critical” and “most pivotal” in pinpointing the two games on the schedule that appear to be the most important and most damaging if overlooked. respectively.
It should be no surprise that Texas is the biggest game on the 2019 schedule for the Sooners. It’s been that way for many years, and once again this season both teams should be ranked when the game is played on Oct. 12 in Dallas. Win the Red River rivalry game and OU will have an inside track on the road to the Big 12 Championship game, which could easily be the Longhorns again this season.
Oklahoma State is projected to finish around the .500 mark this coming season. On the surface the 2019 Bedlam matchup with the Cowboys should pose little concern for OU and its fans when the game rolls around on the final weekend of the regular season.
Except this is Oklahoma State, a rivalry game with deep-seated pride and emotion on both sides (in other words, this game is about much more than just bragging rights), and — here’s the biggest danger sign of all –it’s being played in Stillwater.
I take you back to 2001. The Sooners were 10-1 heading into their final game that season against 4-7 Oklahoma State (coached by Les Miles, now the coach at Kansas). The game was in Norman, but that didn’t seem to matter. OSU scored with under two minutes to go in the game to pull off a 16-13 upset win. That loss was doubly damaging. It cost OU a spot in the Big 12 Championship and a chance to make a back-to-back appearance in the BCS National Championship and defend its 2000 national title.
The 2019 Bedlam matchup does not come at the best time for OU. A loss in this game could torpedo everything the Sooners will be working for in the coming season. That’s why this game stands out as being the most pivotal and the perfect trap game insofar as Oklahoma is concerned.
Circle the date Nov. 30 on the calendar. If ever there was a trap game for the Sooners lying in wait, this one, this year is it.
Beware of Bedlam!