John Mateer finally forgave himself, then played his best game as a Sooner

Oklahoma quarterback John Mateer heard a message the night before the Sooners' win against Mississippi State that he believes could only come from God. Fittingly, some OU fans had started to wonder if it would require a miracle to cure Mateer's turnover problem.

"I was up for a little bit," Mateer admitted to the media after the Sooners' win on Saturday. "It was like right when I woke up, first thing that came to my head. That only comes from One Almighty. I was moved. A couple of minutes (awake), but I was able to go back to sleep."

Mateer had just finished maybe his best game as a Sooner since transferring from Washington State last year, as he was extremely efficient and mistake-free in OU's 23-15 road win against Mississippi State to improve to 4-3. The performance concluded another week of fans and media (myself included) clamoring that Mateer needs to be benched, no matter how inexperienced the options behind him might be. Could it really be any worse?

But Mateer was different on Saturday in Starkville. He didn't force anything. One "catastrophic error," as offensive coordinator Ben Arbuckle put it this week, didn't lead to another. Safety Peyton Bowen might even say Mateer finally had that "swagger back" that Bowen believed Mateer needed to find again.

So, what was different?

"Real answer: I woke up in the middle of the night and something told me to forgive yourself. Real powerful stuff," Mateer said. "I only say that now because I hope everybody hears that. I knew it right when it happened. Forgive yourself and next play matters.

"All day, all I thought is the least important thing is whatever just happened. So the next play, to focus, being calm, believing in who I am. I think I said it earlier this week, like, I know who I am as a player and as a man, and through struggle, that's what you find. I'm not perfect, and I won't be perfect moving forward, but I felt good out there, and I believed."

John Mateer erases mistakes in win vs. Mississippi State

Last week, Mateer looked as if he had turned a corner for three quarters, but then all the good he had done was erased in the fourth quarter with two interceptions, including a pick-six, during the final two minutes of a one-possession game against Kentucky.

Mateer has been turnover-prone all season, and really even last year, but the problem has grown even worse. OU entered Week 8 with the worst turnover margin among all Power 4 teams. Of the Sooners' 14 turnovers this season, Mateer has been responsible for nine of them, with seven interceptions and two lost fumbles.

His mistakes also tend to come at the worst time.

Against Michigan, he threw an interception in the fourth quarter that the Wolverines returned to OU's six-yard line and set up their game-winning touchdown. He turned the ball over in three straight possessions in the second quarter against Georgia, with one going viral, as the Sooners were only two yards from the end zone when the ball slipped out of Mateer's hand and Georgia scooped it up for a score and a 14-point swing that put the contest in hand by halftime. Then, there was, of course, last week's debacle.

“Like I’ve said multiple times, we have to eliminate backbreaking errors, catastrophic errors. For all the good that he does, we have to eliminate those," Arbuckle said this week while defending his QB1 again.

The OU fan base, though, could not forgive Mateer for his mistakes. And, apparently, neither could he. At least not until Friday night.

Then Mateer completed 75.9% of his passes for 283 yards and two touchdowns with no turnovers against Mississippi State. It was a season-high in passing yardage. He's thrown for more yards last season while wearing crimson and cream, but those outings included turnovers or were against weak opponents.

He made plays like this one when there seemed to be no hope, and there were no mistakes to forgive.

"It's been a challenge, as you can imagine," Mateer said. "I thought I've prepared well all year, for every game. But you keep going and you get better every week at one thing, and it's encouraging. It's hard to look at the things that suck, but I'm gonna be honest with you, in the third quarter, I was like, 'Well, I played good for 45 minutes last week, and I woke up on Sunday and felt terrible.' Nothing matters. Fourth quarter, ended up getting tight -- shouldn't have been. We needed to score touchdowns. That's on me. I play quarterback.

"But I said, I don't wanna wake up tomorrow morning feeling some type of way. I wanna win. I want everybody to feel good."

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