Mascots are a traditional, colorful, and some would say an adorable part of the college football environment. The Oklahoma football program has one of the most unique mascots in all of college sports.
The sports website Big Game Boomer’s boasts that it ranks anything and everything having to do with college football. Best teams…best fans…best helmets….best stadiums… How about best mascots? Yes, the team at Big Game Boomer even took that one on, coming out earlier this month with the top-65 mascots in the college football world entering the 2022 season.
The Sooner Schooner, a scaled-down replica of an Old West Conestoga wagon, like the ones used by the pioneers in the famous Land Run of 1889, has been the official mascot of the Oklahoma Sooners since 1980. The Schooner is powered by matching white ponies named “Boomer” and “Sooner,” in reference to the settlers who sneaked out ahead of everyone else before the Oklahoma Territory was opened for settlement (Sooners) and the others (Boomers), who waited for the official opening.
The Sooner Schooner is most visible on Saturdays during football season, when it races onto Owen Field in Norman in victory celebration after every Oklahoma score.
The Best College Mascots Entering The 2022 Season pic.twitter.com/q5iMqj2hkh
— Big Game Boomer (@BigGameBoomer) August 4, 2022
There aren’t many mascots as unique as Oklahoma’s, but to break the suspense, the Sooner Schooner was not included in Big Game Boomer’s ranking. The reason: only costumed mascots were considered.
OU has two costumed mascots — “Boomer” and “Sooner” — who serve as extensions of the Sooner Schooner and are dressed as the two ponies who lead the ever-popular OU official mascot.
Boomer and Sooner rank 20th among the top-65 mascots in the Big Game Boomer ranking (you’d think the name “Boomer” alone would earn them a high placement in this ranking.
The two OU mascots were rated the second best in the Big 12, behind the “Mountaineer” of West Virginia (No. 8), but ahead of Texas’ “Hook’em, Oklahoma State’s “Pistol Pete” (No. 41), “Super Frog from TCU (No. 44), “Cy the Cardinal” from Iowa State (No, 56) and Kansas State’s “Willie the Wildcat” (No. 61).
I have to believe, however, that the Sooner Schooner would have, or at least should have, rated even higher than 20th if it had met the qualification requirements.