What a great atmosphere last Saturday was. The rain had finally stopped. Walking up to the stadium there were several pieces of military equipment on display that the kids as well as the adults got to sit in or have their picture taken by.
The soldiers manning the displays answering questions and taking pictures with the fans.
The Army Black Daggers parachute squad jumping into the stadium with the game ball.
The full field size American flag unfurled for the National Anthem. Just a great patriotic feeling all around.
But then to the chagrin of most Sooner fans, the game didn’t follow up on that good feeling. The Army Black Knights came just a few plays away from pulling off their biggest win since World War II.
Running an option attack that kept the ball away from the Sooner offense for 44 minutes and 41 seconds, that’s 19 seconds shy of 3 full quarters, Army took OU to overtime before finally falling 28-21. The Sooner defense could not stop the Army option attack. Army was content to gain 3 or 4 yards a play and was able to rack up 26 first downs while bleeding the clock dry.
And when OU did get Army in a fourth down, they just went for it and converted all four attempts for the first down until the final fourth down play in overtime ended in a Sooner interception.
The defense while playing hard, constantly over ran the pitch man and was unable to stop the fullback dive from getting at least 3 or 4 yards a pop. Again, 3 or 4 yards a play will get you a first down every time.
But as much as the OU defense couldn’t stop Army, the Army defense REALLY couldn’t stop OU’s offense. The Oklahoma offense scored at will. The only thing that stopped them was the fact that they only had the ball for 15 minutes and some really bad play calling by Riley.
If Oklahoma could have only gotten a two score lead on Army at any point, the game would have been over.
And OU had a golden opportunity to do just that when they held Army to a three and out to start the third quarter. Army punted and OU ripped off an eight yard run play on first down. But instead of a methodical march down the field, Riley ran a deep pass on second down going for the quick score and it was intercepted. Army then drove the field to score the tying touchdown and ran almost all of the third quarter off the clock in doing so.
On OU’s next possession they were stuffed on 3rd and goal at the 1 yard line and 4th and goal at the 1 yard line. And on either play Murray could have break danced in for a touchdown if he had kept the ball rather than handing it off to Sermon.
At that point I thought Army was going to win the game as there was only about 11 minutes left in the fourth. I could see Army running the clock down as they had all day, and scoring the game winning field goal or TD.
But credit where credit is due, the defense forced a turnover and gave the offense a golden opportunity to win the game in regulation.
But then Riley went into a shell. He played for a field goal rather than a touchdown and Siebert promptly shanked a 32 yarder to send the game to overtime.
Luckily the defense bowed up once more after the offense scored a touchdown and picked off Army’s 4th down throw to end the game. It was really a weird and frustrating game to watch.
But in the end, the Sooners did enough to win the game.
Everyone remember what Baylor did last year to the Sooners in Waco?
Everyone remember what Baylor did last year to the Sooners in Waco?
A lot of people will go on about Army running a junk offense that Oklahoma will not have to see again until 2020 when OU travels to West Pointe. That the defense is getting better and the Army game was an anomaly.
We will quickly find out as the Baylor Bears come to town for a 2:30pm kickoff at Owen Field.
Everyone remember what Baylor did last year to the Sooners in Waco? They took OU to the very end of the game with a chance to tie in regulation. They scored 41 points and ran up over 500 yards of offense. And that was as a 27 point underdog who eventually only won 1 game last year.
Baylor has only gotten better and has the skill players to score points against this Oklahoma defense.
Wide receiver Denzel Mims, who at 6’3” tore up the OU secondary last year, is back. And joining him is senior wide receiver transfer Jalen Hurd who at 6’4” gives the Bears another big wide out to be unleashed on the undersized Sooner secondary.
Remember Iowa State? They just threw the ball up to their 6’5” wide receiver that could not be tackled by our defensive backs and scored two touchdowns on us along with amassing 174 yards.
Make no mistake; this is a big game for the Oklahoma defense. This game will show us if they are really better than last year, or if it is the same old OU defense that we have had for the last 6 or 7 years.
The offense will score on Baylor and score a lot. But will it be enough?
That’s why the Worry Meter is back up to 75% this week. For better or worse, we will know a lot more about this Oklahoma team come Saturday night. With all that being said…BOOMER!!!
— Dave
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