Which of Sooners' legendary head coaches had the best record against the hated Horns?

Success for an Oklahoma football coach is measured as much, if not more, by how the Sooners do every season against their primary rivals as their overall record.

Historically, those rivals have been Texas, first and foremost, but also Nebraska and Oklahoma State. The rivalry with Nebraska, for all intents and purposes, ended when the Cornhuskers left the Big 12 for the Big Ten after the 2010 season. The Bedlam Series with Oklahoma State likely has come to an end, certainly for the foreseeable future, because of the Sooners' move to the SEC.

While the games with Texas, Oklahoma State and Nebraska every season were always viewed differently than the rest of the schedule, the Sooners and their fans will tell you their chief rival always has been and continues to be the Texas Longhorns. And the 120th edition of the Oklahoma-Texas rivalry will take place this Saturday at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas.

Of the teams Oklahoma has played more than 10 times in its long history, Texas is the only one that owns a winning record against the Sooners (61-53-5).

All of this got us wondering which of Oklahoma's legendary head coaches had the best record in the Red River border-war battles against the hated Longhorns.

Bud Wilkinson lost two of his first five games against Texas before stringing together six consecutive wins over the Longhorns from 1952 to 1957, the most consecutive wins against Texas by any Oklahoma head coach. It is also of note that Wilkinson lost six consecutive times to Texas over his final six seasons at Oklahoma, immediately following the six-game winning streak.

In his 17 seasons at OU, Wilkinson was 9-8 against Texas with two of those nine wins coming against a Longhorn team ranked in the top-five nationally. In 1963, Wilkinson's final season at OU, No. 2 Texas defeated No. 1 Oklahoma 28-7. That was the only time in the long history of the Red River Rivalry that featured the top two teams in the country.

Barry Switzer did not lose to Texas until his fifth season (1977) as head coach, although one of those years (1976) the games ended in a 6-6 tie. Switzer finished his Oklahoma coaching career with nine wins, five losses and two games that ended in a tie. Besides the 1976 game, the 1984 game ended in a controversial 15-15 deadlock, a game that to this day Oklahoma claims to have won. Switzer won one game when both teams were ranked in the top-five, but all five of his losses were against Longhorn teams ranked in the top five of the Associated Press poll.

Switzer was very familiar with Texas by the time he became the Sooners' head coach, having faced the Longhorns six times as Oklahoma's offensive coordinator (1966-72). His record during that span was not nearly as impressive. The Sooners were 2-4 against Texas while Switzer was the OC, but that is also when OU's winningest head coach by winning percentage became enraptured with the Wishbone offense.

Bob Stoops, the winningest coach in Oklahoma football history based on total wins (190) also compiled the best record against the Sooners' chief rival. Stoops was 11-7, a .637 winning percentage, against Texas, including a five-game win streak between 2000 and 2004. In the 2000 season, No. 10 Oklahoma shocked No. 11 Texas, winning 63-14 en route to a perfect 13-0 record and the Sooners' seventh national championship in Stoops second season as head coach.

Bennie Owen, the first of Oklahoma's four 100-win head coaches, also had his battles against the Texas Longhorns. The two teams didn't play every season like they do today and have since 1929. Owen's Oklahoma teams faced Texas 16 times in his 22 seasons at the helm with each team winning eight times. By the time Owens stepped down as the football coach (he also coached the OU basketball and baseball teams),

Owen was the first Oklahoma head coach to register a win in football against Texas. Before Owen became head coach, the Sooners were 0-5-1 against their neighboring institution from the Lone Star State.