TEXAS-OU Game Thread

My thoughts were if only Major had been healthy...

 

I don't know Worsterman, I think the aggies losing to anyone is very assauging. Or is it assaugenous? I'm not sure. Maybe assaugemy? Does anyone know?

 

Well said WorsterMan...'bout sums it up

 

Feel like we're not "fully loaded" this year, but, if we keep these great recruiting classes each year, the depth will materialize and the big games will start going our way...

 

I had 3 disagrees to my response to LC. I would have expected more. I am uphauled.

But seriously, despicable cheating aside, the football program at Oklahoma has been better than Texas overall for decades. The number of weeks at #1 in the AP for OU is easily 10 times what Texas has. Heisman winners? Come on. NCs? Other individual awards on defense?

I'm as big of a Texas fan as anyone on here, but I may be one of the more objective and realistic.

Royal won his first 8 or 9 against OU. Pretty much it was him whose teams built up the overall lead. They are closing the gap. Will they ever catch Texas? Hope not.

Oh, I almost forgot conference titles. I shouldn't have to remind everyone of Oklahoma's 11 outright championships out of 23 to Texas's 3. It's pathetic. Oh, and OU has a 12th co-championship.

But, y'all can disagree. That's good message boarding right there to be disagreeable.

Edit to add: The 3 blowout losses under Mack Brown. Think about it. Stoops had his number. Even with VY and the 2005 year when OU was down that year, we could only manage to tie for the largest margin of victory against Oklahoma.

 

Dicker the Kicker played well...

 

HIC, preaching to the choir over here! Ohio State vs Michigan, Oklahoma vs Texas, Alabama vs Auburn, USC vs UCLA....Texas has won a LOT OF FOOTBALL games all-time, but if it gets down to crunch time and a TITLE of any kind is on the line, OU WANTS THE TITLE AND WILL DO WHATEVER IT TAKES TO GET IT!!!! Under Mack, Texas got Vince and company and got the first NC in over three decades. We won't get another one as long as we're busying ourselves with references to cheating (I forget why we call them paper clips). We need to load up on recruiting, keep Herman, and basically WANT THE WIN more than they do (if at all possible)….

 

Can't disagree. I do want Texas to win without cheating, and I think most references to Oklahoma's cheating, at least for me, refer to the Oklahoma Land Rush of 1889 and pretty much the Switzer years. Bohmar and the auto dealership thing aside, it seems Stoops ran a mostly clean program. To me, paper clips refers to their "OU" logo. Looks like a paper clip. How do they get OU from University of Oklahoma, anyway? Kind of stupid.

These things aside, yes, they want the hardware more, it seems.

 

Yes, my apologies on that one.

However, since that falls into the "Special Teams" facet, his kicks may not have outdone the bad decisions in the kick return game. So, overall bad in that facet. IMHO.

 

Yeah but dicker lowers his helmet when he tackles

 

I'm not sure I would have classified WVU as a "big game" though...

 

@zuckercanyon, I recently looked up the Michigan-Ohio State rivalry. It is hyped year in and year out, and it is much closer that Texas-OU in overall head to head.

But, look at the last 20 years or so. tOSU has dominated it so thoroughly, it should be relegated to the B1G 3rd tier TV coverage every year, but ESPN touts it as a big game.

OU hasn't been quite as dominant, but, conference title wise and nationally, they are more relevant than Texas and it isn't even close.

Hell, go back and look since Royal left and see how many times Texas actually enters the RRR undefeated compared to Oklahoma. Again, it's a joke.

 

Do "better defenses" exist in the Big12?

 

When he is able to try and lay someone out, I cannot help but to chuckle and recall the scene from "Remember the Titans..." Went something along the lines of...

Sunshine lowers a shoulder as a defender sort of flies over him
opposing coach- ref, how about a flag for unsportsmanlike conduct?
ref: on the quarterback? Get real...

 

This is only partially true. We have always had the series lead. The 1940s also helped give us a large lead.

You actually ignore that we dominated OU in the 90s and actually tied our largest lead of the series in 1999 at +21 games.

As for Mack Brown, he was 6-6 against OU from 1998-2009 which was certainly not good, but was not bad either. The problem is, the wheels came off for us this decade and they have stayed firmly on OU's sooner schooner.

Mack was 1-3 this decade against OU. Strong was 1-2. Herman is currently 1-3. Right now, this has been the least successful decade against OU in Texas history.

Mack Brown fell off and we were not great when he left, but we were not terrible either (and even convincingly upset OU). DKR fell off and so did Akers among others. The difference this time was that we made the worst hire in program history in Charlie Strong and we are still recovering. The hire that followed Brown was worse than any hire this school has ever made. I say this NOT to excuse Herman in the present as he coached a horrid game yesterday and the loss is 100% on Herman and his staff's shoulders. However, why we have been so pitiful this decade entirely sits on the shoulders of Bill Powers for the Strong hire.

At this point, I hope we finish strong and maybe pull out a miracle rematch upset of OU in the Big XII title. Herman needs to improve, but if he can keep improving, the 2020s have the potential to be a lot better.

UT's largest series leads:
1970 UT +21 games
1999 + 21
2019 + 14

1900s UT
UT 9 OU 2 T 1
UT +7

1910s OU
OU 6 UT 3
OU +3

1920s UT
UT 3 OU 0
UT +3

1930s UT
UT 6 OU 3 T 1
UT +3

1940s UT
UT 8 OU 2
UT +6

1950s OU
OU 7 UT 3
OU +4

1960s UT
UT 9 OU 1
UT +8

1970s OU
OU 6 UT 3 T 1
OU +3

1980s OU
OU 5 UT 4 T1
OU +1

1990s UT
UT 7 OU 2 T1
UT +5

2000s OU
OU 6 UT 4
OU +2

2010s OU
OU 8 UT 3
OU +5

Longest win streaks:
UT 8 (1940-47 and 1958-1965)
OU 6 (1952-1957)

Best Eras:
UT: 12 of 13 from 1958-1970
OU: 9 of 10 from 1948-1957

UT was 21-10 from 1940-1970
OU is 14-7 from 2000-2019
OU is 16-14-1 from 1990-2019

Best decade for UT: 1960s +9
Best decade for OU: 2010s +5

 

@Htown77, you are missing the point.

Mack was great overall, obviously. He had a losing record against Stoops, who is the coach I said had his number. 3 huge blowout losses. I mean, come on, man.

And, the other point I that Oklahoma has been more relevant nationally and in Big XII titles since its inception.

Hell, I know Gardere won 4 in a row in the 90s. We managed some wins in the 80s. So what? They win titles. Texas doesn't most of the time.

Now, you can post a mother really long post with stats but that doesn't matter either. No objective fan, and I guarantee if you ask neutral fans who the better program has been for decades, the answer won't be Texas. Sad but true.

 

Perhaps also worth noting --
The total yards from two of the bigger games on the day

Big 12 game (ou/Texas): 821 yards
SEC game (LSU/Florida): 968 yards

 

In the past 30 years, we have won the same number of national titles aka the only titles that matter.

Conference titles are silly. Especially given our previous conference no longer exists and this one might not exist 10 years from now. If 10-2 Texas upsets 12-0 OU in the Big XII Title rematch, it is extremely silly to give that more weight than the overall record, final ranking or bowl game.

 

Okay, if you say so.

 

NCs are hard to win. The first goal is to win the conference. I doubt you will find many people who would say otherwise.

Edit: Conference titles are silly? Wow man that is one of the craziest statements I have ever seen on here.

 

Seriously, @horninchicago, if Texas finishes 12-2 and OU finishes 13-1, with both of us winning NY6 Bowls and UT upsetting OU in the conference title, which team finishes ranked higher?

After OU finishes ranked higher, comeback and tell me conference titles matter.

In 1996 we upset Nebraska and won the Big 12 title. We finished #23. They finished #6. #ConferenceTitlesDoNotMatter

 

Well, I'm living in the real world here. Nothing suggests that Texas would beat OU in a rematch. Hell, they way they played yesterday, it sure as hell is no lock they can make the CCG to even upset OU. And you said it, as usual, it would be an upset. Proves my point that most of the time OU is higher ranked and better than Texas.

 

Frankly, OU, because of everything I'm saying, would get the benefit of the doubt in the final poll if they won their bowl in your scenario. The polls love them.

 

@Htown77, I admire your defense of Texas against Oklahoma. I'm probably older than you, so the Switzer years and Stoops domination have me soured in this respect. Texas needs Oklahoma to be good to get national respect, but we can't get national respect when OU is good. They find a way to win the conference, silly as it may be, and get more national respect in rankings, Playoff talk, and Heisman winners.

 

I say we need a new passing game coordinator or maybe even a new offensive coordinator. Beck has to go. But I have a feeling Herman is too loyal about that. LSU found a very good offensive coordinator we can do the same thing. If we hang on the beck we will continue to follow behind the Sooners.

 

2001 Nebraska plays for national title despite not even playing in the Big 12 Title Game
2003 OU plays for national title despite losing Big 12 Title Game
2011 Alabama wins national title despite not even winning its division
2012 Notre Dame plays for national title despite never having been in a conference
2016 Ohio State makes playoff despite not winning its division
2017 Alabama wins national title despite not even playing in its conference championship
2018 Notre Dame makes playoff despite not even being in a conference.

I only bring this up to say that I am tired of hearing about conference titles in general when it is clear that America does not care about them.

My personal opinion is:
1. We should scrap conference title games since they are often bad and do not matter;
2. Expand the playoff to 8 games;
3. Take the best 8 teams regardless of conference;
4. Have the first round played the current week of the conference championship games at the home sites of the top 4 teams;
5. Keep the current NY6 structure with the 4 winners playing in the "playoff bowls" and the 4 losers playing in the non-playoff NY6 bowls.

OU is indeed higher ranked most of the time whether they are better than Texas or not. I certainly agree they have been certainly better this entire decade. However, this has been one of the worst decades in Texas Football in general and it entirely falls on the Strong hire. Hopefully Herman improves and makes the 2020s better.

OU is only 16-14-1 from 1990-2019 against us the past 30 years. We have the same number of national titles. It FEELS worse due to the conference titles and the fact this past decade has been the worst decade we have ever had against OU. We did have a winning record 1990-2009. OU was not better than us most of the time 1990-2009 like they have been 2010-2019. Like I said above, the wheels came off our program this decade and OU has stayed strong. Mack Brown fell off from great to good. Strong took us to bad. Herman has slowly gotten us from bad to good again. Unfortunately it appears Riley will continue winning so Herman has to step up and (no one get triggered) make us great again.

I 100% agree that we probably would not win a rematch. I do not expect us to win it. I do expect us to go 10-2 only because the rest of the Big 12 is GARBAGE. This is a very down year for the conference. OU is the only great team. We are a good, not great team. After that Baylor is okay... and that is about it. We really should finish 10-2. I am not saying we win, but we have a good shot at the rematch only because the rematch is always a HUGE advantage for the loser (see my many threads on why the Big 12 title game is incredibly dumb).

 

I don't think Herman will hesitate to cut coaches loose if this keeps up.

But he won't do it mid-season, plus we're probably going to go on a 6 game win streak.

 

Disagree. The rematch usually favors the better team, regardless of who won the first game.

Examples of OU winning both regular season & Big XII Title games against the same opponent:

-2000 (Kansas State)
-2002 (Colorado)
-2007 (Missouri)
- Missouri was ranked #1 entering the 2007 Big XII Title game, but OU was favored
-2017 (TCU)

The only time OU has lost a Big XII title game to this point, it was against a Kansas State team it did not play in the regular season.

Other examples of the rematch being won by the regular season loser is usually just because the regular season loser was the better team & was just upset in the regular season, such as in 1999 & 2018.

There are exceptions like in 2001, but usually the better teams wins the rematch regardless of who won the first game.

UT’s best chance to beat OU is by being Texas against OU in which anything can happen & UT often pulls the upset against OU (1989-1992, 2013, 2015, 2018, etc.)