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KewlKat00
09-19-2005, 08:32 PM
Bummer Sooner
Big Red fans forced to cope with down year
Posted: Monday September 19, 2005 12:54PM; Updated: Monday September 19, 2005 2:20PM

Here's just a hint of what it was like growing up in Sooner nation: Back when I was in high school in Tulsa, I visited my friend John Ashley one day and arrived at his home to see a new red Cadillac parked in his driveway.

We're talking RED, and shiny like a cheerleader's smile.

John's dad -- Doctor A., we called him -- was a Sooners fan with a phat "f." He owned season tickets and drove the 100 miles from Tulsa to Norman for every home game as if he was going around the corner for beer. He breathed the Sooners.

A man of few (mostly muffled) words, he nearly scared John and I to death one night when he whooped and began dancing a jig in his living room after hearing he'd won a lottery that granted him the privilege of paying even more money for the right to buy more Oklahoma tickets.

Doctor A. didn't need a new car. The old brown Caddy ran just fine. But it had one flaw. "If you're gonna be a Big Red fan," he said, exhaling a cloud of cigarette smoke, "you gotta have a Big Red car."

That Big Red Caddy has long seen its last trip to Norman. And Doctor A. isn't up to driving much any more. Not that the Sooners are giving him much reason to this year. A team that reached the national championship game in each of the last two seasons endured its second defeat of the season last Saturday, losing to -- no, getting spanked by -- UCLA 41-24 in the Rose Bowl. (Did USC coach Pete Carroll email his old OU game plan across town, knowing he wouldn't need it again anytime soon?)

How's Doctor A. feeling these days? "He's moaning," John told me on Sunday night. "I kinda hoped we'd be reloading like USC, but it looks like we're rebuilding."

Not what us Sooner bred want to hear, but you gotta love how quickly things change in college football. Forget the NFL's quest for parity, Major League Baseball's big market-small market dilemma and how no one in the NBA can seem to find a way to beat the Spurs. Almost a month into the college football season, the perennially contending Sooners are 1-2 and out of the top 25 for the first time in the Bob Stoops era, Miami isn't the best team in Florida, Ohio State sooooo doesn't miss Maurice Clarett, Notre Dame has NBC execs smiling again, and it looks as if Texas just might finally beat OU when the border rivals meet in three weeks for the bazillionth Red River Shootout.

O.K., I concede that USC just might be better than the Minnesota Vikings, a fact that has not changed in three years. But otherwise, this is shaping up as one of the best college football seasons in years -- except in Sooner nation.

Radio jocks throughout the buckle of the bible belt are calling for Stoops' head. That's loony, of course. The guy lifted the Sooners from purgatory seven years ago, leading them to six bowls in his first six seasons. His 68-14 record gives him a winning percentage (.829) higher than that of legendary OU coach Bud Wilkerson (.826) and just a notch below the .837 mark set by that self-styled bootlegger's boy, Barry Switzer.

Moreover, the Sooners lost 15 of 22 starters from last year's team, including 11 players who were selected in the NFL Draft, more than any other school -- including USC. But do you think they care in Sooner nation? Not a bit.

The team is weak just about everywhere, except at running back, with Adrian Peterson. But a young offensive line and butterfingered QB Rhett Bomar (the redshirt freshman fumbled four times against the Bruins) are making Peterson's wondrous freshman season look like an aberration. "It's just poor football," Stoops said following last Saturday's game.

Still, Stoops should have little to fret about. Hot seat? It ain't even warm. Like most major-college coaches, he makes a ton of cheese. Firing him just might bankrupt the state. This year, Doctor A. and other Sooner faithful will have to hope for a season-salvaging upset of No. 2 Texas on Oct. 8 and the continuation of Stoops' perfect string of bowl appearances. Neither hope is pure fantasy.

The reality, however, is that Texas coach Mack Brown will be favored to defeat OU. He hasn't done so in five years, a string that had Texans looking to whack Mack. Instead, Brown re-tooled his staff, and woke up one morning and found himself coaching the most exciting QB in the nation, junior Vincent Young.

Stoops has been there. But not this year.


http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2005/writers/roy_johnson/09/19/pass.the.word/index.html
(there is actually a funny picture of a texas fan holding a sign that says "for sale:oklahoma season tickets")