November is the time during the college football season when championship teams separate out from all the rest. Teams that are playing their best and win the month of November are the ones that play for conference championships and put themselves in position to play for something even bigger.
The Sooners' 33-27 win over Tennessee on Saturday was the seventh November win in Brent Venables' four seasons as head coach. The problem is, his Sooner head-coaching resume also includes six loses in 13 November games, which is far below Oklahoma's historical standard for the final month of the regular season.
November has long been a big month in Oklahoma's storied history, but not so much lately
Oklahoma is off to a great November start this season, but has three daunting challenges still ahead in games against No. 4 Alabama, No. 22 Missouri and LSU, which began the season as the nation's No. 9 team.
Venables had considerably more success in November as a member of Bob Stoops' OU coaching staff from 1999 to 2011. The Sooners were 34-10 in November during that time.
In the past 25 seasons, or since 2000, Oklahoma's record in the month of November is 76-20, a winning percentage of .798. Since 1947, the legendary Bud Wilkinson's first season as the Sooners' head coach, Oklahoma's overall winning percentage in November is a strikingly similar .783 (108-28-2). Over that time frame, of course, the Sooners have won seven national championships and won outright or shared 43 conference championships. And most of those were won because of OU's performance down the homestretch in the month of November.
Most Sooner fans remember how successful Stoops' Oklahoma teams were winning big games in the important month of November. During his 18 seasons as head coach, Stoops' teams won 56 games and lost 12 (.824) in the month. Directly or indirectly, that led to a national title and 10 Big 12 championships.
As good as Stoops' Oklahoma teams were in November, though, Wilkinson's teams were even better. Between 1947 and 1963, Oklahoma won 66 games in November and lost just six times, the most famous of which was a 7-0 loss to Notre Dame that snapped the Sooners' record 47-game winning streak. Three of their six November losses during that span came in the same year in 1960.
OU won three national championships (1950, 1955 and 1956) and 14 conference titles in Wilkinson's 17 seasons and produced a .917 winning percentage in November.
Barry Switzer's OU teams were equally dominant during the month of November. Ten times in Switzer's 16 seasons at the helm of the Sooner football program Oklahoma didn't lose a game in November. The Sooners were 51-8 (.864) under Switzer in games played in November, with four of the eight loses coming at the hands of Nebraska.
Switzer's teams matched Wilkinson's three national championships and contributed 12 conference titles. You can be certain that the way the team played down the stretch in the final three or four games in November was a prime factor in all that success.