OU defense flying around
OU’s defense is playing a whale of a game. Flying to the football. Intensely pressuring Chase Daniel. Hitting hard. Very hard. And the Sooners have turned back two Mizzou red-zone threats, holding the Tigers to field goals. Mizzou has moved the ball at times, but two questionable pass interference penalties have aided Missouri as much as anything.
Curtis Lofton is playing great. The OU secondary is playing well, too. It lost Tommy Saunders on a 3rd-and-10 play for a 21-yard gain, but otherwise, no coverage busts. The return of Auston English has energized the defense. English hasn’t gotten to Chase Daniel yet, but just his presence seems to have been a lift.
Quentin Griffin II
Chris Brown’s 3-yard touchdown run, basically off a shotgun draw, looked like vintage Quentin Griffin. Brown got the handoff in traffic, but traffic that didn’t yet know what was the play. Brown stutter-stepped, dashed outside a little and found an easy opening into the end zone.
Nothing, though, is coming easy for OU. Even after the 47-yard completion to Malcolm Kelly set up the Sooners at the Mizzou 7-yard line, things got hairy. Brown and Sam Bradford had a miscommunication on a handoff, after Bradford changed the play. Then Phil Loadholt jumped early, and OU was back to second-and-goal from the 12.
The Sooners already have 53 yards in penalties. Stop that, or they will get beat.
Where’s the downfield game?
Missouri leads 3-0 with 3:19 left in the first quarter, and OU has 22 total yards. The Sooners have tried two runs, both losses by Allen Patrick, and five passes. Four of the five have been swing passes, and the only downfield throw came on 3rd-and-23 when Sam Bradford threw incomplete, well short of the first-down marker.
Here’s my suggestion. Throw the ball downfield. The Sooners have to loosen up the Mizzou defense.
Stoops might blow a gasket
Bob Stoops might just go nuts. His Sooners have committed two personal fouls in a three-play span. One forced OU into a 3rd-and-22 situation; the other gave Mizzou decent field position despite the Tigers being flagged for a block in the back on a punt. Stoops was saying the other day how much he detests personal-foul penalties.
Trent Williams committed the first personal foul for OU, and he needs to settle down. He was whoofing in the face of a Missouri player after Iglesias’ 14-yard reception on the first Sooner play, and that could have been a 15-yard penalty. Then Allen Patrick got a personal foul on the punt. Both players received less than pleasant receptions when they returned to the sidelines.
Shaky start in Alamo City
Shaky start for both teams. Nic Harris blew up a Missouri reverse pass, resulting in an 11-yard loss and eventually a 3rd-and-21 situation. OU, after a 14-yard completion to Juaquin Iglesias, suffered back-to-back losses, then back-to-back penalties and faced 3rd-and-23. That’s now these high-powered offenses are supposed to go.
Delay of game penalties drive me nuts, and I assume coaches, too. Missouri’s defense seemed to be confusing Sam Bradford on the first possession. Mizzou’s Chase Daniel didn’t seem confused, but he did seem to be under intense pressure. The Sooner D looked like it came to play.
Not a sellout
The Big 12 title game is not going to be a sellout. We’re 15 minutes before kickoff, and the corners of the Alamodome basically empty. Not big chunks; maybe 2,000 people shy of capacity. But still, the ‘Dome seats about 65,000, some 13,000 less than Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City, which always sells out the Big 12 title game unless Colorado is involved.
OU has about a 2-to-1 edge in the Alamodome crowd, by most estimates, although the Riverwalk edge seems to be about 3-to-1. San Antonio quickly will become a favorite of OU fans as far as Big 12 title venues. Easy drive or easy flight, lots to do, good weather. And the North team is a long way from home.
On the Riverwalk
Friday night, Sooners dominated the Big 12 title game. I flew from Dallas to Oklahoma City on Friday morning and was stunned by all the Missouri fans on my plane. Probably 30 or so, with only about 10 OU fans. I thought, wow. Then I waited on comrades Ebony Jackson and Jake Trotter for their flight from OKC, via Houston, and when their plane landed, you’d have thought it was an Oklahoma land run. Forty, maybe 50 OU fans emerged, and the guys said the plane ride was wild, with the flight attendant dogging Missouri and Southwest playing Boomer Sooner over the PA and OU fans chanting.
And Friday night on the Riverwalk, OU fans clearly dominated. Must have been 5-to-1, maybe more, although admittedly red stands out more than black. I saw all kinds of people I knew, from OU team chaplain Kent Bowles and his family, to ex-Sooner hoopsters Bo Overton and Steve Bajema (who dined with ex-Norman High sharpshooter Steve Eoff; that was one solid basketball table). And that was all just at Cafe Ole’.
Anyway, I think Saturday afternoon is going to be wild. I think the Riverwalk, say 2-3 p.m., will be wilder than Dodge City the night of payday, and it will be painted crimson. San Antonio is the best spot for this game, and OU fans will respond en masse.
As for the game, I still expect a thriller. High scoring. Lots of big plays. Missouri has so many weapons, it will be hard to hold down the Tigers. The Sooners don’t have as many weapons; they will resort to more physical football. I don’t know who will win. I picked Missouri 28-27 but have no real insight with that one.
I will say this. I think Gary Pinkel has proven to be a very good coach and has built a solid program. Looks like a Bill Snyder program to me. Something built for the long haul. The only question of sustainability is this: How will Mizzou fare once Chase Daniel is gone. OU has proven it can with just anybody playing quarterback. Missouri has not. Of course, barring injury, that won’t be a factor tonight. Daniel is in the house.
Who will win in San Antonio?
I was on a St. Louis radio show Tuesday night, on KMOX, the station that carries Mizzou, and the host, Kevin Wheeler, told me he’s picking OU to win the Big 12 title game. Funny thing, I said, I had been thinking Missouri would win. Bob Stoops seems awfully confident, so I was starting to change my mind, but it got me to thinking.
Most media people, even the non-allegianced, tend to slightly overrate the teams they cover. Toss-up game? OU-Texas or OSU-Tech or something? Generally, we think the locals will prevail. Unless they’re no good. But you get my point.
Which made me wonder about OU-Mizzou. If I’m leaning toward Missouri, and the St. Louis guy is leaning towards OU, this must be one heck of a matchup. And it is. First Big 12 title game matching top-10 teams since 2001, when Colorado and Texas played at Texas Stadium.
This is going to be fun.
Quit your beefing
I’m getting a little tired of hearing fans and coaches gripe about the disparity of some conferences playing league title games and some not. No one put Pistol Pete’s six-shooter to anyone’s head. If a league is playing a title game, it’s by choice.
And besides, a league title game in the Big Ten or Big East wouldn’t solve anything anyway. If Ohio State played a title game this week, exactly how much hope would you place in the Buckeyes going down? An upset is possible, but a big upset it would have to be. Ohio State played one bad game, lost at home to Illinois, and no one else in the Big Ten put up much of a fight.
But at least the Big Ten historically has had some parity. Not so with this new Big East. West Virginia is going to make the title game with one of the easiest roads ever. West Virginia is 10-1 and will be 11-1 when it spanks Pittsburgh. Kansas is 11-1 and I’ve been hooting the Jayhawks’ schedule all year. But KU’s schedule is no worse than West Virginia’s. West Virginia’s best wins: at Maryland, which finished 6-6; home against Mississippi State, 7-5; at Rutgers, 7-4; at Cincinnati, 9-3; and Connecticut, 9-3. So its best wins are Cincinnati and UConn, two upstart programs. West Virginia lost to South Florida.
Compare that to Kansas. Its best wins are at Texas A&M, 7-5; at Oklahoma State, 6-6; and at Colorado, 6-6. UConn. Kansas lost to top-ranked Missouri.
I don’t see much difference. Yet West Virginia is ushered into the national title game, because of the softness of the Big East. The problem isn’t conference tilte games. The problem is some conferences.
Give me a playoff
If the NCAA would adopt my playoff plan — an 11-team playoff, with only conference champions involved — think how great would be not just the playoff, but the regular season. That’s the problem with all the 16-team or 8-team playoffs. When you bring in the wild cards and at-large berths, you’ve got just as big a mess as we’ve got now, and you’ve watered down the regular season.
But if only conference champs were involved, we would hit December with still seven conference titles to be determined: Big 12, ACC, Pac-10, SEC, Conference USA, Mid-American and Sun Belt. Talk about a royal Saturday. Do-or-die is what makes for great theater, and that’s what we’ve had the last couple of weeks, and what we would have Saturday, and then what we would have in the ensuing playoff, in which five teams would get first-round byes and the other six champs would fill out the bracket.
My plan is the best combination of protecting the regular season while also creating a post-season buzz.
