OU Texas Six Gunnin’
Posted on: October 15, 2017
-A few bullet point thoughts on yesterday’s game.
–Oklahoma really misses Abdul Adams. All year he’s been able to find holes that other backs couldn’t. Looking back at the Iowa State game and yesterday’s game with Texas, losing him with the foot injury has been the biggest loss so far. The 99 yarder against Baylor was a game changer and before he went out last week he was averaging 10.6 yards per carry. He just seems quicker through the hole while Sermon who is playing really well mind you seems to be a bit too patient at times.
–Stopping the run or at least limiting the run game is the key to stopping Oklahoma’s offense. Before the Orlando Brown holding penalty, Lincoln Riley called a beautiful play action pass to Dmitri Flowers that would’ve put the Sooners up 27-10. The play action is the key to making this offense hum, and finding ways to stick with it will be key for the rest of the year.
–Oklahoma had key penalties at key times. Brown’s holding to take the TD off the board. Oklahoma was up 17-0 with a 4th and 1, when Wren had the false start…Punt. Sooners are up 20-0, and give up the big kickoff return, and then Beal gets hit with the personal foul to get the horns down to the 16. It has been almost like, this team can’t find the jugular. They had the Horns on the ropes early, and just made small mistakes that let the horns crawl back into it.
–Speaking of penalties…I’m not one for blaming things on the refs, but especially in the 2nd half Oklahoma COULD NOT Buy a holding penalty call on Texas. I’m normally not one for yelling at the TV either, but it got pretty blatant at times. Obo, Overton, Bledsoe, Ward…everybody was getting held, and for whatever reason the refs wouldn’t call it. They finally started calling a couple, but there were times that Sooner pass-rushers were just getting tackled.
–Obo has to be more disciplined in his rush. Time after time he’d take the inside move and let Ehlinger get out on the edge to run for a first down. I’m all for giving a premier pass rusher some freedom, but you gotta contain.
–I did like the increased intensity, activity and pressure by the Sooners front 7 and the team as a whole. Mike was calling pressures, and some of them were getting home. Early in the game, the defense looked dominant, and had the kickoff return not happened ala 2008 to let em up off the rug, I think the Horns get boat raced in this one.
–37 rushes vs. 30 pass attempts for the Sooners. In the Lincoln Riley offense normally when the Sooners run more than they pass, that means a win. Early on it seemed like it would be the Trey Sermon show. The true freshman had a heck of a day with 20 carries for 96 yards. Rodney Anderson got untracked later and showed really nice burst on the TD run. One of my buds was calling the counter play for Anderson and was right, his acceleration is really nice. I would have like to have seen more run calls.
–It seems that there are times that Oklahoma can run the ball at will, but then the Sooners go away from it. After the holding penalty by Orlando Brown I talked about earlier, the Sooners never really had a string of run calls after that until it was time to force Texas to use all of their timeouts. On the drive where the Flowers TD got called back, it would have been an 8 play drive with a Mayfield sack, six Sermon runs and a play action dart for the TD. After that there were only four designed run calls. Granted there was a quick drive with the long Andrews TD, but we’re talking about the last 20:56 of the game. Seems like prime time for a big back combo like Anderson & Sermon.
–This team has more guts than I gave em credit for. They had to fight their tails off to win this thing. This was a gutty win. Injuries to key players, things not going right, penalties at bad times, not getting any calls until late in the game, Baker’s 1st INT of the year…lots of things went wrong for the Sooners yesterday but they won.
–Not sure after seeing how gassed the Sooners front was why when we knew there would be no threat of a run that we didn’t see Addison Gumbs, Kelly & Jackson line up and just rush. We saw Jackson some, but one of those guys is getting home when it’s pin your ears back time.
–I’ll be interested in the recruit reaction to this game. Had the Sooners lost this game it would have been an avalanche of momentum for Texas. Herman has them playing and finding a way right now, and most importantly he has em believing. I kept thinking to myself that the Sooners better get em now because if this slipped away, it woulda been tough to get em again.
–The Sooners need some key Defensive Recruits. They need Bobby Tre Brown in a bad way. The Sooners shouldn’t have to blitz to get pressure, and while guys played better yesterday, if Oklahoma is going to be in the upper echelon of FBS, then they have to get more difference makers who can win one on one or even two on one matchups in the trenches.
–It was a good win, it was a gut win, and finally it was a win over Texas. The Sooners now go @K-State, Texas Tech @Ok State & vs. TCU. The next four weeks are a meat grinder. If the Sooners win those four and then finish at home with the Mountaineers unscathed, they’ll deserve to be in the conversation.
–Finally, they gotta stay healthy. They can’t have stupid penalties, and they gotta start catching some breaks. They need Abdul Adams and CeeDee Lamb to get healthy in a hurry. This team is banged up and need some key personnel for the stretch run.
