PLaw
7/26/2011, 10:30 PM
From the Sporting News:
Forget Texas, on the field Oklahoma is Big 12's real star
PUBLISHED 6 hours and 19 minutes ago
LAST UPDATED 5 hours and 41 minutes ago
Matt Hayes
Sporting News
DALLAS – We interrupt the fear and loathing of Texas for a special announcement: The team that dominates where it matters most has entered the room.
Finally, there is normalcy again.
For two days the Big 12 has tried to reinvent itself, tried to re-brand who and what it is while bickering back and forth about Texas and its controversial Longhorn Network.
Then Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops walked into the building, and all the hype and hoopla suddenly was replaced by more pressing matters, like talking about the Sooners winning championships.
“I have a great feeling about the chemistry of this team,” Stoops said.
The Sooners have earned far more hardware than their Red River rivals Texas. In case everyone around here forgot, when the stadiums are full and the lights are on, it’s all Crimson and Cream, all the time in the Big 12.
So while every other school here is concerned about its place in an ever-changing game, while the conference searches for an identity, it’s time to embrace the security of what is.
Oklahoma has its sights set on winning another conference championship. And if everything falls just right, another national championship.
“Our goals never change year after year,” says OU quarterback Landry Jones. “Anything outside of what we do, what we can control, is useless to us.”
Want to know why Stoops didn’t get sucked into the Longhorn Network argument; why he wasn’t complaining about an unfair recruiting advantage for Texas or why the Big 12 continues to capitulate to anything burnt orange?
Because it’s about who wins and who loses. Entering the 16th year of the Big 12’s existence, Oklahoma has won seven conference championships.
Texas has three.
“Oklahoma has set the bar in our league,” said Iowa State coach Paul Rhodes. “The rest of us are chasing.”
Just how dominant has Oklahoma been? The Sooners have made it look so easy so often, the only thing left to achieve are national championships. And there’s the rub.
When Stoops arrived in Norman in 1999, the program was reeling from probation and poor coaching hires. The championship aura of years past and the storied tradition of Wilkinson and Switzer were long gone. With that kind of history, selling the idea of what could be was easy.
But, now that Stoops has become part of the fabric of OU’s lore, now that his teams have won championships and filled the Switzer Center with shiny trophies of seasons past, selling that idea doesn’t carry the same oomph.
Players once entranced by the thought of winning it all in 2000, have become players entitled by the mere mention of it. In three appearances in the national title game since the Sooners won in 2000, they’re 0-3 with close losses to LSU and Florida and a blowout loss to USC.
“Back (in 2000), we had something to prove and we were bound and determined to do it – to live up to what they were supposed to do at Oklahoma,” Stoops said. “So I go from trying to convince them that we deserve to do it, to a few years later saying you haven’t done anything, why would you expect to do this until you’ve earned it?”
Stoops likes to tell the story of Ryan Broyles, a former under-recruited, undersized wide receiver who wanted to play at Oklahoma for all the right reasons. Stoops didn’t have to beg him to come to Norman, didn’t have to worry about whether he would back out of his commitment or how he would act once he arrived on campus.
He showed up on Day 1 and worked harder than anyone else, and now is an All-American who has set 10 school records.
“Sometimes you get five-star recruits with two-star work ethic,” Broyles said.
And sometimes things aren’t what they seem until you dig down and see it for what it is.
Go ahead and reinvent yourself, Big 12. The Sooners are more interested in winning another championship.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
BOOMER SOONER 'nuff said
Forget Texas, on the field Oklahoma is Big 12's real star
PUBLISHED 6 hours and 19 minutes ago
LAST UPDATED 5 hours and 41 minutes ago
Matt Hayes
Sporting News
DALLAS – We interrupt the fear and loathing of Texas for a special announcement: The team that dominates where it matters most has entered the room.
Finally, there is normalcy again.
For two days the Big 12 has tried to reinvent itself, tried to re-brand who and what it is while bickering back and forth about Texas and its controversial Longhorn Network.
Then Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops walked into the building, and all the hype and hoopla suddenly was replaced by more pressing matters, like talking about the Sooners winning championships.
“I have a great feeling about the chemistry of this team,” Stoops said.
The Sooners have earned far more hardware than their Red River rivals Texas. In case everyone around here forgot, when the stadiums are full and the lights are on, it’s all Crimson and Cream, all the time in the Big 12.
So while every other school here is concerned about its place in an ever-changing game, while the conference searches for an identity, it’s time to embrace the security of what is.
Oklahoma has its sights set on winning another conference championship. And if everything falls just right, another national championship.
“Our goals never change year after year,” says OU quarterback Landry Jones. “Anything outside of what we do, what we can control, is useless to us.”
Want to know why Stoops didn’t get sucked into the Longhorn Network argument; why he wasn’t complaining about an unfair recruiting advantage for Texas or why the Big 12 continues to capitulate to anything burnt orange?
Because it’s about who wins and who loses. Entering the 16th year of the Big 12’s existence, Oklahoma has won seven conference championships.
Texas has three.
“Oklahoma has set the bar in our league,” said Iowa State coach Paul Rhodes. “The rest of us are chasing.”
Just how dominant has Oklahoma been? The Sooners have made it look so easy so often, the only thing left to achieve are national championships. And there’s the rub.
When Stoops arrived in Norman in 1999, the program was reeling from probation and poor coaching hires. The championship aura of years past and the storied tradition of Wilkinson and Switzer were long gone. With that kind of history, selling the idea of what could be was easy.
But, now that Stoops has become part of the fabric of OU’s lore, now that his teams have won championships and filled the Switzer Center with shiny trophies of seasons past, selling that idea doesn’t carry the same oomph.
Players once entranced by the thought of winning it all in 2000, have become players entitled by the mere mention of it. In three appearances in the national title game since the Sooners won in 2000, they’re 0-3 with close losses to LSU and Florida and a blowout loss to USC.
“Back (in 2000), we had something to prove and we were bound and determined to do it – to live up to what they were supposed to do at Oklahoma,” Stoops said. “So I go from trying to convince them that we deserve to do it, to a few years later saying you haven’t done anything, why would you expect to do this until you’ve earned it?”
Stoops likes to tell the story of Ryan Broyles, a former under-recruited, undersized wide receiver who wanted to play at Oklahoma for all the right reasons. Stoops didn’t have to beg him to come to Norman, didn’t have to worry about whether he would back out of his commitment or how he would act once he arrived on campus.
He showed up on Day 1 and worked harder than anyone else, and now is an All-American who has set 10 school records.
“Sometimes you get five-star recruits with two-star work ethic,” Broyles said.
And sometimes things aren’t what they seem until you dig down and see it for what it is.
Go ahead and reinvent yourself, Big 12. The Sooners are more interested in winning another championship.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
BOOMER SOONER 'nuff said