When will we know if Sooners are contenders or pretenders for a College Football Playoff berth?

Despite being picked to finish eighth this season in the SEC Preseason Media Poll, there is still a little bit of a mystery that surrounds Oklahoma Team 130 as it kicks off its 130th year of varsity football and first among the college football aristocracy that is the SEC.

With nine SEC teams -- the most ever from one conference -- ranked in the preseason top-25 polls issued by the Associated Press and the nationwide panel of head coaches who vote in the Coaches Poll, it's probably reasonable to assume that as many as four teams from the SEC could make it into the 12-team College Football Playoff this season.

Blake Toppmeyer of the USA Today network took a stab this week at how soon in the 2024 schedule we might know whether the nine ranked SEC teams will be championship contenders or pretenders. At lot can happen over the course of a college football season, especially un the mega-competitive SEC, where some of the best teams in the country are playing each other seemingly every week.

But, as Toppmeyer identifies, there are certain games and matchups during the season that are telling and provide a pretty good idea if those nine ranked SEC teams are bona fide College Football Playoff contenders or not. No single loss is going to knock an SEC team out of Playoff consideration, but we should have reliable indicators before Halloween, Toppmeyer says, whether a team is for real as a Playoff contender.

For the Oklahoma Sooners, ranked 16th nationally but as just the eighth best team in the SEC, Toppmeyer says the moment of truth will come as early as the fourth game of the season.

That's when the Sooners will host Tennessee and OU alum and former Sooner All-American Josh Heupel, now in his fourth season as head coach of Tennessee. Another sellout crowd is expected at Gaylord Family Oklahoma Memorial Stadium on the third weekend in September for Oklahoma's first conference game of 2024 and first as a member of the SEC. It will also be the Sooners fourth consecutive home game to open the season.

That may seem pretty early to determine the chances for Oklahoma to make the 12-team playoff field, but Tennessee is a game many analysts, as well as the ESPN matchup predictor, are projecting as an Oklahoma win. Should the Sooners lose, in all probability it would be only their first of the season after three consecutive victories. Given the difficulty of the remainder of OU's conference schedule, however, the Sooners can ill afford to loss three game, and losing to Tennessee likely would be one too many.

"A loss to the Vols (by Oklahoma) would mean a .500 record is likelier than a playoff berth."

- USA Today's Blake Toppmeyer

Interestingly, Toppmeyer has also singled out the Oklahoma-Tennessee game as a barometer of the Volunteers' legitimacy to contend for a playoff spot.

The Sooners also show up in Toppmeyer's analysis in a contender/pretender reveal game for No. 6-ranked Ole Miss. Oklahoma travels to Oxford, Mississippi, in the heart of SEC Country, for a difficult road challenge on Oct. 26 against the likely top-10 ranked Rebels. "A win here (against OU), "Toppmeyer writes, "should give Ole Miss good positioning, even if it losses road games against LSU and Georgia, while a home loss would show the Rebels were overhyped in the preseason."

What Toppmeyer failed to add, though, is that an OU upset win at Ole Miss, along with an earlier home win over Tennessee would be a big boost to the Sooners' playoff argument.