Most Overrated Defeats

[Leroy Lizard]

For some reason, everyone recalls the 1978 Arkansas/OU game as a battle between David and Goliath. Yes, Holtz had suspended some of his star players. But Arkansas was still a Top-10 and the game was played in a rainstorm. Sims and Lott had no traction at all and OU simply had a bad day in every which way.

All three Miami games in the 1980s were competitive, but most people talk like the Hurricanes blew us out 50-0.

Another overrated defeat: Last year's game against Boise State. Judging by the way everyone reacted, it was as if Tulane had beaten us.

Sorry to bring up defeats at a time like this. But if OU loses this game, people will talk about the time that an itty bitty Missouri team went up against the OU juggernaut and beat them all by their teensy-weensy selves.

[TUSooner]

Well, I guess you have to define "overrated defeats" You mean most lopsided? Biggest upset? Most painful? Most meaningful?

I think I'd rather talk about underrated wins :D

[OzarkSooner]

For some reason, everyone recalls the 1978 Arkansas/OU game as a battle between David and Goliath. Yes, Holtz had suspended some of his star players. But Arkansas was still a Top-10 and the game was played in a rainstorm. Sims and Lott had no traction at all and OU simply had a bad day in every which way.


If you ever talk to anyone who is an Arky fan, and I mean ANYONE, the 1978 Orange Bowl game is the ONLY game that they've ever won of any importance. They cling to the memories of that win like grim death. It's very sad actually. I lived down there in Little Rock for awhile (1981-1987) and it was not unusual to see stickers still on cars with the score from the Orange Bowl. Even when we beat them to the tune of 42-8 the next time we played them, they still wouldn't shut up about the OB win.

[Jello Biafra]

If you ever talk to anyone who is an Arky fan, and I mean ANYONE, the 1978 Orange Bowl game is the ONLY game that they've ever won of any importance. They cling to the memories of that win like grim death. It's very sad actually. I lived down there in Little Rock for awhile (1981-1987) and it was not unusual to see stickers still on cars with the score from the Orange Bowl. Even when we beat them to the tune of 42-8 the next time we played them, they still wouldn't shut up about the OB win.


yeh...i have family in arkansas and they don't talk about anything but 78. i asked them this year at thanksgiving about the 2001 cotton bowl *crickets chirping* i tell them they had 49 total yards. they don't believe for some reason.

[soonerspudman]

For some reason, everyone recalls the 1978 Arkansas/OU game as a battle between David and Goliath. Yes, Holtz had suspended some of his star players. But Arkansas was still a Top-10 and the game was played in a rainstorm. Sims and Lott had no traction at all and OU simply had a bad day in every which way.

All three Miami games in the 1980s were competitive, but most people talk like the Hurricanes blew us out 50-0.

Another overrated defeat: Last year's game against Boise State. Judging by the way everyone reacted, it was as if Tulane had beaten us.

Sorry to bring up defeats at a time like this. But if OU loses this game, people will talk about the time that an itty bitty Missouri team went up against the OU juggernaut and beat them all by their teensy-weensy selves.

In that Arky game believe the sooners were #1 and teed up for a "cakewalk" to another NC, that's why it hurt. Their 2nd team RB Roland Sales ran for like 200 yards and we fumbled a bunch.

The Miami games were spun as lopsided by the east-coast media because that's when they were trying to build up the Big East for big viewing ratings - they still are but they no longer care about Miami since they jumped to the ACC, the media's dropped them like a cheap whore.

On the BSU game, people forget the spread was only 7 points, not a "game" upset that even registers, but a mamouth upset considering the program histories. Just ten years ago BSU was losing to teams like Portland State and Cal State Northridge.

Kinda same thing with Mizzou, spread is about 3, but comparing program histories is huge...

[aero]

For the most part, we are usually going to be rated higher than whoever we are playing and, although we usually beat whoever we are playing, we are going to lose some and people are going to remember the champ going down. So while me may have lost some big games in the past and recently, its a testament to our team that we are in so many big games. You've got to play in them to have a chance for the hardware.

[TUSooner]

In that Arky game believe the sooners were #1 and teed up for a "cakewalk" to another NC, that's why it hurt. Their 2nd team RB Roland Sales ran for like 200 yards and we fumbled a bunch....
I think we were 2 or 3, but everybody ahead of us lost. So we would have been #1 if we'd won. After that loss I literally drank myself into a stupor - the only time I've ever drank like that because I was sad or mad.

[BoulderSooner79]

I was at the '78 ('77 season) orange bowl and I could tell it was trouble before kickoff. Switzer and the other coaches were walking on the rain soaked field talking and shaking their heads. The water was over their shoes and probably into their socks. My friends told me you couldn't tell on TV. That team was built on pure speed and a fast field and this was bad. That Arkie team was very good and had only lost to Texas in a very close game (as had OU that year). Joe Montana led ND to a victory over #1 Texas in the cotton bowl, so OU had a chance to "back door" a MNC had they won. ND got the number #1. Hats off to Arkansas, but it wasn't a huge upset. OU was still a building team towards the peak in '78 and Billy wasn't even the featured back yet. He got hurt in that dramatic tOSU game earlier in the year.

That '88 Orange bowl loss to Miami was the greatest game that never was in my opinion. It ended 20-14, but wasn't really that close. OU was as dependent on Jamelle Holieway that year on offense as UO was dependent on Dennis Dixon this year. Jamelle got hurt against aggie lite late in the game. OU managed to beat heavily favored NU anyway to get to the OB undeated. They couldn't do anything against the stout Miami D. with the backup QB. 3 runs up the middle and punt. But the defense play like madmen and kept them in the game - even tied at half. It seemed Miami had the ball the entire f'ing game and still only had <300 total yards. If Jamelle had played, it might have been the best MNC game ever.

The biggest honesttogod OU upset I remember was the Kansas loss in '75 in Norman. That '75 was so good and yet so lethargic - it proved to me a team can get tired of winning. They hadn't lost since '72 with a lot of the same core players who were seniors that year and they just didn't have the fire. They almost lost the next week to Mizzou in that famous little Joe 2 point conversion game. They still won the MNC anyway.

[Breadburner]

The 78 Orange bowl was my first dose of OU football.... A kid came to school later that year with the score on the front and he was a hog fan....But the Sooners took the hogs lightly and did some partying instead of focusing on the game and it cost them.....

[goingoneight]

LSU 2003/4.

Anybody with a brain knows who dominated the 2nd half and OU was a dropped TD pass away from OT.

21-14, LSU... everyone seems to think LSU owned us. If anything, they should have won by a lot more considering Jason White was hobbled and they were playing on their home field.

[ouwasp]

When Tulsa beat OU back in the Blake years. Was it '96? I was there to see Caswell take it 99 yards to the house. :(

Anyhow, for the next several years it seemed Tulsa tv stations never missed a chance to replay it. but it was against one of the worst Sooner teams in modern times...

Games won against blake/schnelly teams should have an * placed beside them. <shudder>

[BoulderSooner79]

LSU 2003/4.

Anybody with a brain knows who dominated the 2nd half and OU was a dropped TD pass away from OT.

21-14, LSU... everyone seems to think LSU owned us. If anything, they should have won by a lot more considering Jason White was hobbled and they were playing on their home field.

I second that vote! Reading the press after that game, you'd think it was 50-0 blowout. I thought is was an over-throw of K. Jones and not a drop. But it was obviously a play the coaches had in their pocket that they knew would work. There was also a phantom holding call in the secondary against OU that negated an interception a bit earlier. That would have been a short field opportunity to tie. A tense, defensive struggle between #1 and #2 where any single play could have turned the game. And yet it was an OU "flop" controlled by an underdog team. sheesh.

[KingBarry]

After that loss I literally drank myself into a stupor - the only time I've ever drank like that because I was sad or mad.

Only happened to me one time, also. 1988. NCAA Men's basketball finals.

i still feel sick when I think of that. Literally the worst loss evar as far as I'm concerned.

[SteelClip49]

The loss to Oklahoma State still hurts the most because with that win, it would have been an easy win over Colorado in the Big 12 Title and then on to Pasadena to play Miami. We were better than Miami in 2000 and we certainly had what it took to play with Miami in 2001 had we gotten the opportunity.

[busynothings]

yeh...i have family in arkansas and they don't talk about anything but 78. i asked them this year at thanksgiving about the 2001 cotton bowl *crickets chirping* i tell them they had 49 total yards. they don't believe for some reason.


I live in the here in hog country, and married into a Razorback lovin' family. My father-in-law likes to remind me that they beat us then. I always tell him that it was two years before I was born, so I don't care, and that they haven't beaten us in my lifetime. With him it's all in fun though.

[cheezyq]

LSU 2003/4.

Anybody with a brain knows who dominated the 2nd half and OU was a dropped TD pass away from OT.

21-14, LSU... everyone seems to think LSU owned us. If anything, they should have won by a lot more considering Jason White was hobbled and they were playing on their home field.

I'm with you on this one. There's an LSU fan at my work that thinks we were totally dominated. All I had to do was send him a link to the play-by-play that shows we were on their 11 with less than 2 minutes left.

[NYC Poke]

I had to go to scout camp in Arkansas the summer following that Orange Bowl because of the whole Gene Leroy Hart thing. They gave us serious crap the whole time. I have had a distaste for Arkansas ever since.

[astro5169]

OU Football's worse loss in my book is always either the last or the next one. I cant forget about the last and don't think the next will ever happen.

[SteelClip49]

Whatever turd neg-spek'd me just because I said we would have played with Miami needs to fess up now you low life scum POS. A Sooner fan neg spekking me for saying OU would make it a game.

The dude that neg spek'd me says this- "you are out of your mind. miami drills us like they drilled nebraska." What kind of Sooner are you? Miami was great but not 1995 Nebraska great. If you are going to red spek me, do it for a stupid remark. This was nowhere near stupid. Then again, you are probably a Cowpoke in disguise so I could understand the hostility.

[Jmorales22]

OU Football's worse loss in my book is always either the last or the next one. I cant forget about the last and don't think the next will ever happen.


Truer words have never been spoken. I can't believe nobody has brought up the most humiliating loss. Well we all know what that is and I guess that's not the point of this thread anyway. It's the game of which we do not speak.

[BoulderSooner79]

Truer words have never been spoken. I can't believe nobody has brought up the most humiliating loss. Well we all know what that is and I guess that's not the point of this thread anyway. It's the game of which we do not speak.

I guess it depends on how you interpret the point of this thread. I took it talk about losses where it is presented as at "David and Goliath" situation where OU (Goliath) should have never lost, but the matchup was really more even. That's why I pick the LSU loss after the '03 season. There's no way LSU was a "David" and it was a close game. I never liked our chances against 'SC and I thought they would win handily (but not *that* handily). The '04 team was not nearly as strong as the '03 team on D and we didn't match up against their receivers. And we were the underdogs in that game, so how could it be an upset loss? I guess it was "bad" not because we lost, but because we did not even compete.

Yes, BSU was an upset, but a mild one. We should have won, but they were pretty good and it took overtime and a miracle play to do it. So over-rated.

Bad losses (not over-rated)
CU this year
OSU in Norman ('01 ?)
Kansas '75 - OU was 10x better and should have never lost.

[Jacie]

I don't think the loss to the pigskins is overrated. Oklahoma was favored by 2 touchdowns since then arkie coach Lou Holtz (it had to be him!) had suspended two or three of their starters earlier in the week. The score was certainly lopsided enough and because of the results from the Cotton and Rose Bowls, Oklahoma was poised to win a National Championship. More disturbing were the rumors (we'll never know exactly what happened) concerning Switzer's antics on a postseason trip to Hawaii with the coaching staff and their wives. It kind of made people suspect that he had lost his focus on winning. There were also stories of some players partying it up really hard in the days before the game. There have been upsets over the Sooners by teams that would be considered less likely to do so than arkie, but for the reasons outlined above, this one really stung.

[Leroy Lizard]

If the point spread was indeed 14 points in 1978, then the bookies were crazy. This year's point spread for the ****** matchup was only 12 points.