Only four times in the Associated Press poll era has a team lost as many as two games in a season and been awarded the national championship.
In four of Oklahoma's seven national championship seasons, the Sooners finished the season undefeated (11-0 in 1955, 10-0 in 1956, 11-0 in 1974 and 14-0 in 2000).
Oklahoma began the 1985 season with consecutive wins at Minnesota, at Kansas State and against archrival Texas at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas. The Sooners' home season opener did not fall on the schedule until the fourth game of the season. No. 3 Oklahoma hosted the unranked Miami Hurricanes, coached by former OU assistant and Oklahoma State head coach Jimmy Johnson.
The 1985 game was the third meeting all-time between the two teams. Barry Switzer's OU teams had beaten the Hurricanes twice in his first three seasons. Miami finished the 1984 season with an 8-5 record and lost its 1985 season opener to No. 5 Florida. The Hurricanes then ran off four straight wins against overmatched teams and came to Norman that season with a 4-1 record.
Miami may have been unranked coming to play at OU in September of 1985, but the Hurricanes were loaded on both sides of the ball with future NFL talent, including quarterback Vinny Testaverde, who backed up Bernie Kosar for a couple of seasons before earning the starting role. Also on that team were running backs Alonzo Highsmith and Melvin Bratton, along with wide receivers Michael Irvin and Brian Blades. Defensively, the Hurricanes featured tackle Jerome Brown and defensive back Bennie Blades.
The Oklahoma roster also had its share of NFL talent, including nose tackle Tony Casillas, linebacker Brian Bosworth and defensive back Ricky Dixon on defense, and tight end Keith Jackson and running back Spencer Tillman on offense. The starting quarterback in that game for Oklahoma was a player named Troy Aikman.
Early in the second quarter with Miami leading 14-7 and Oklahoma facing a third-and-10 at the Miami 17-yard line, Aikman dropped back to pass and was sacked by Miami's Jerome Brown for a 12-yard loss. But that wasn't the worst result from the play. Aikman broke his ankle on the tackle and was out for the rest of the season. The future NFL Hall of Famer would never play another down for Oklahoma, transferring to UCLA after the 1985 season.
Oklahoma attempted a 46-yard field goal after the Aikman injury, but the kick missed to the left. The Sooners were never able to recover after that.
Aikman's replacement in the Miami game was true freshman Jamelle Holieway. Miami led 14-7 at halftime and tacked on 13 more points in the third quarter to stretch its advantage to 27-7. Holieway led an OU scoring drive early in the final quarter, but it was too little, too late as the Hurricanes managed to hold on for a 27-14 upset victory over the third-ranked Sooners.
Following the loss to Miami, Oklahoma went on to win its remaining seven games of the regular season to finish 10-1, then defeated top-ranked Penn State in the Orange Bowl to capture its sixth national championship and third under Switzer. And Holieway became the first true freshman quarterback to lead his team to a national championship, a record that remains intact still today.
Miami continued to be Switzer's and OU's Kryptonite for the next two seasons, and on New Year's night 1987, No. 1 Miami and No. 2 Oklahoma met in the Orange Bowl for the national championship, which was won by the Hurricanes, 20-14.
The Sooners' lost just one game in each of the 1985, '86 and '87 seasons, and all three times were against Miami.