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    Sooner Benchwarmer milesl's Avatar
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    'A dream come true' for Mayfield (part 2) good LONG article

    A good spring puts him in position to win the job

    Coming off that epic Sugar Bowl performance, Knight didn’t have the type of season he wanted and many expected last year.

    He threw for 2,300 yards and 14 touchdowns to 12 interceptions, but those 12 were costly, as they tended to come at critical times.

    Later in the season, Knight suffered a dangerous injury of transient quadriplegia in the fourth quarter of a blowout loss to Baylor at home.

    Knight returned as the starter for the Russell Athletic Bowl against Clemson, but the offense sputtered in yet another blowout loss, a 40-6 drubbing in which he threw three picks and went only 17-for-37 for 103 yards.

    That, coupled with Mayfield’s emergence on the Scout Team, had him poised for a true quarterback competition with Knight and Cody Thomas.

    Mayfield excelled in the spring and took advantage of it for the most part.

    His familiarity with offensive coordinator Lincoln Riley’s new offense seemed to put him at an advantage momentarily.

    However, the Spring Game suggested his lead might not be as big as it appeared. He threw for a touchdown and 176 yards on 10-of-13 passing, but also made a couple mistakes for picks.

    All four quarterbacks competing for the job—Justice Hansen didn’t transfer until after the Red-White Game—threw an interception in the scrimmage.

    “Yeah, I think definitely putting some balls up that [they were trying to do too much with],” Stoops said. “You know, all these guys, you put some balls up when it’s practice [and say], ‘Ah, it’s no big deal. It’s an interception.’ But, you know, when you’re in there game type situations it’s a bigger deal. So they’ll learn from it. And no, this isn’t indicative of what I’ve seen really all spring. I’ve been pleased with what they’ve been doing really all spring."

    Despite the interceptions, Mayfield was still probably the leader heading out of spring.

    “It’s just exciting being back into it, being back in the game knowing that there’s a chance I can play,” Mayfield said. “But just nice getting back out there live, full go.”

    Hansen transferred, and the three continued the battle throughout summer, before Mayfield suffered some shoulder fatigued that placed him on the shelf for a bit.

    Meanwhile, Knight and Thomas, who battled some shoulder fatigue of his own, continued on what were good summers for them, setting the stage for the competition this fall camp.
    Mayfield edges out the other two in friendly competition

    If he carried a lead into fall camp, that gap wasn’t much because Knight, after all, was the incumbent and a surging Thomas flew into the battle as well.

    Mayfield was well aware of that.

    “Oh, it was very close, and a lot of people don’t realize it wasn’t just Trevor and I,” Mayfield said. “Cody was in it, too. He’s gotten a lot better as a player, and he played his butt off all camp, all summer. And so it was very close, and it came down to the wire, but it made us all better.”

    Players traded moments this fall camp of making good plays and then some not-so-good plays that involved some poor decision-making.

    With the good and the bad, Riley had a decision to weigh.

    Who could make the most plays while making the fewest mistakes?

    “It was close. You know, it was close,” Riley said. “And it worked perfectly with the schedule. And as the competition went on and they were all tight enough, we kind of looked at the schedule, knew we were going to have a couple off days and that might be a chance to kind of catch our breath, you know, and look back because when you’re in the middle of camp [it’s nonstop].

    “I mean, we do as many two-a-days as anybody in the country here. You know, the schedule is just jam-packed. It’s a survival day in and day out, and so it was a good chance for us to kind of take a step back and let our thoughts settle, to go back and review some things from camp. And we did that and made the call.”
    Making the call

    It’s an anxious moment for anyone, heading in to the coach’s office to find out whether he’ll be the guy or not.

    That’s what Knight, Mayfield and Thomas had to do Monday morning.

    Riley had informed the three he wanted to think about the decision over the weekend before making it and gave them a heads up, texting early Monday morning that he wanted to meet with them.

    For some reason, though, Mayfield wasn’t nervous.

    “That’s something that people might find strange,” Mayfield said. “I don’t really get nervous when it comes to that stuff."

    Interestingly enough, Thomas had his meeting before Mayfield’s, and how he addressed Mayfield speaks to the character of these quarterbacks and this team and, to a greater level, to the culture of this program.

    “I ran into Cody Thomas right before because he got out of his one-on-one right before me, and he gave me a hug and said, ‘Congrats, buddy,’ which is normal Cody,” Mayfield said. “He’s a nice guy. So going into it I knew.”

    That didn’t take away from his reaction, however.

    “I mean, it’s always nice to hear that you’re going to be the starter,” Mayfield said. “And at some point everybody’s going to play so I’ve just got to relax and do my thing, too.”

    Said Riley: “Well, he was excited, I mean, of course. I mean, they’ve all wanted this for a long time. But, you know, our conversation was that’s how it’s going to be, but then there are also things that you’ve got to keep improving at, too. This is just a point in the road. This is not a stopping point or an end point. You know, we’re just getting started here. And I made that clear with all of them, and they all came out and responded today.”
    Soaking it all in

    After getting the nod Monday, Mayfield has now walked on and won the starting quarterback job at two different schools in the Big 12.

    That’s impressive, to say the least.

    The list of guys to start at QB at colleges in the same conference: Jeff George at Purdue and Illinois, Matt Moore at Oregon State and UCLA, Brent Schaeffer at Tennessee and Ole Miss, among others.

    But Mayfield is a walk-on to do so, a walk-on.

    That’s in rare air, and especially at a place like OU.

    “Well, he’s, you know, a really heady player,” said Stoops, when asked what it means that he’s done so. “He’s talented throwing the football. You could tell he loves the game. So he’s got [a lot of tools]. There’s a lot to him as an individual competitor, and he doesn’t shy away, obviously, from anything.”

    And Mayfield’s hardly had time to sit down and think about it, considering the Sooners are fully in preparations for their season opener in less than two weeks against Akron.

    But he did have one moment Monday where he sat back and took it in.

    “Phone call to my dad,” Mayfield said. “I know he’s been worried. It’s a tough transition transferring and having to sit out. I know he was worried about me, but I told him I was fine throughout the whole thing, told him to keep his spirits up. I think he was more worried than I was.

    “But that phone call to him and telling him and my mom, too, right after—that was pretty relieving. It definitely lifted weight off my shoulders.”

    And maybe it’s even a little bit more special delivering that news to his mother considering a recent car accident that had her and his aunt seriously injured.

    “It was pretty tough,” Mayfield said. “It was a car wreck that she’s lucky to be alive. Seat belt served her life, but it caused most of the damage. But [I’m] just happy to have her here and my aunt, [who] was in it, too. And had a couple fatalities in that wreck, which is very sad for those families that had that happen. But having—our only time off is May so she wasn’t there at all when I was back home so that was pretty tough not seeing here. So being able to go back on the weekends this summer and see her was pretty nice, coming home to mama.”

    Now, he’s the quarterback at The University of Oklahoma and realizes full well what that means, winning championships, as he said.

    “I mean, I could see a vision in my head that I thought I’d play here eventually,” Mayfield said. “So it’s a dream come true for me. But what happens on the outside, what other people said, they doubted me, but I’m here now playing so that’s just how it works out…I mean, it’s not over now. We have the whole season ahead of us so, I mean, this is just the beginning.”

  2. #2

    Re: 'A dream come true' for Mayfield (part 2) good LONG article

    Good stuff. Thanks for posting.

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