Oklahoma football: Sooners hold winning record over every major conference

Oklahoma football coach Lincoln Riley, like his predecessor Bob Stoops, isn’t shy about playing against good teams in big nonconference games.

That has been OU’s history since the Bud Wilkinson years, when the Sooners established their relevancy and residency among college football’s big boys.

This year, because of the continued nationwide spread of the coronavirus, it is beginning to look like the so-called Power Five conferences are going to go with abbreviated 2020 schedules and eliminate all nonconference games. The Big Ten and the Pac-12 have already announced such a move, and the Big 12, ACC and SEC say they will reassess the situation at the end of July.

When asked in April, a couple of weeks after all college spring sports activities, including football spring practice, had been shuttered because of the COVID-19 pandemic, about having to play football games without fans in the fall, Lincoln Riley told Mark Packer of ESPNU Radio:

"“We’ll play in the parking lot if that’s  where they want us to play.”"

Just tell us who, when and where and we’ll be there ready to go, the Sooner head coach added.

The Sooners’ schedule generally always includes at least one nonconference game against a team from a Power Five conference. In recent seasons, they’ve had home-and-home series with UCLA, Ohio State and Tennessee, and the Sooners are scheduled to host Tennessee in their second game of the 2020 season.

OU’s winning percentage against Power 5 teams is just a little less than against the Big 12.

It’s not surprising Oklahoma likes playing outside of the conference. The Sooners are 59-8 (.881) in nonconference contests the last 20 seasons and 15-5 in games against Power Five teams during that span.

Oklahoma owns a winning record against all four of the other Power Five leagues. The Sooners have done the best against teams from the Atlantic Coast Conference, with a 41-9-1 (.814). The Sooners are 7-0 against North Carolina all-time, 9-1 against Pittsburgh and 6-1 versus Florida State. It hasn’t all been roses, though. They’ve had their trouble against Clemson and Miami. They are are 5-7 combined against those two schools (2-3 against Clemson and 3-4 in the all-time series with Miami).

Among the Power Five leagues, Oklahoma has played more games against teams currently in the Southeastern Conference than any of the other major conferences. But that is largely because two SEC teams (Texas A&M and Missouri) were formerly members of the Big 12.

Oklahoma is 109-49-8 (.657) against current SEC members, including a 10-4-1 record against Arkansas and 3-2-1 versus Alabama.. The Sooners are just 1-2 in their three games against LSU and, surprisingly, have been matched up with Florida and Georgia just once, losing to both teams.

Against teams currently in the Pac-12, the Sooners are 67-32-2 (.672). That includes a 6-1 record versus Oregon and 5-1 against UCLA. OU is just 2-6-1 all-time, though, in nine games with Southern California.

Oklahoma has fared worse against Big Ten teams historically than the other major conferences. The Sooners are 61-45-3 (.573) against the Big Ten. Eighty-six of those 109 games, however, were against former Big 12 rival Nebraska, against whom the Sooners are 45-38-3. Take the Cornhuskers out of the equation, and OU is 16-7 against the rest of the Big Ten. The Sooners are 2-2 against each Ohio State, Penn State and Wisconsin, but are just 1-3 all-time against Northwestern.

As far as Oklahoma’s historical record against the teams that currently make up the Big 12, the Sooners have a league-best winning percentage of .717 (439-149-24). OU has won 92 percent of its games against Iowa State (76-6-2), 90 percent against Baylor (27-3) and 81 percent all-time versus in-state rival Oklahoma State  (89-18-7).