Idaho State is the actual game the Sooners are worried about

When the third-ranked Sooners rolled into Jerry Jones’ football palace last Saturday with roughly sixty thousand devoted followers in tow, the game against Brigham Young University merely seemed like a formality.

How could a team with a Heisman Trophy winner at quarterback, two running backs with thousand yard seasons in 2008 and a defensive front seven more talented than most video game teams possibly lose to any opponent not graced by Tim Tebow?

Even the most scrupulous observer of college football knew that BYU’s only chance to win involved our gridiron heroes completely forgetting that they were scheduled to play until approximately 3 p.m. Saturday. This, Sooner fans, is precisely what I believe took place.

Saturday’s contest had all of the makings of a classic ‘trap’ game. For those not versed in sports terminology, I’ll define a ‘trap’ as a contest between two unevenly matched teams where the superior team is faced with a far better opponent the following week.

Tragically, this week’s matchup against Idaho State fits that description flawlessly.

The entire offseason Bob Stoops dutifully denied looking past BYU on the schedule, repeatedly stating that the Cougars were going to be a tough opponent.

Such statements were merely necessary so as not to provide motivational material to the overlooked team.

The players undoubtedly had the Idaho State game circled as soon as they received this years’ schedule.

Let’s look at the facts: the ISU Bengals may be one of the only programs whose rich football tradition rivals our own.

Despite what some ignorant observers may say, the difference between the schools isn’t their football success. It’s their goals.

While Sooner fans take great pride in the accomplishments of the nationally ranked football team, those at Idaho State obviously cherish their lack thereof.

A quick gander at the two schools’ awards over the past ten years or so is enough to make any Sooner quake in his cleats.

Since 2000, OU players have racked up 18 major individual awards including the Heisman and Outland Trophies and the Nagurski, Davey O’Brien, Walter Camp, Dick Butkus, and Chuck Bednarik Awards.

According to their website, the Bengals heroically managed to avoid all but two accomplishments in their last ten years, both of which occurred during their shameful 8-4 campaign in 2003.

Mark Hetherington earned I-AA Player of the Week honors while Jared Allen (now starring for the NFL’s Minnesota Vikings and presumably shunned by the ISU faithful) captured the Buck Buchanon Award.

But let’s look past individual accomplishments; this is a team game, after all.

Great programs are measured by their consistency, and the boys from Pocatello, Idaho have been even more consistent than the Sooners since 2006, throwing up only six wins as compared to our eight losses.

To put this into greater perspective, they refused to win only 17 percent of the time in the last three years, making our .810 winning percentage look slightly less successful.

These statistics even factor in the Bengals’ disappointing 36-33 win over Sacramento State to end last season, ruining their goal of a winless campaign.

While perusing these astounding numbers over the offseason, Coach Stoops undoubtedly uncovered another shocking truth on some sleepless night: should his Sooners manage to score more points than those devious Bengals, they actually will propel the opponent to a victory!

This reversal of gridiron mathematics perfectly explains the Sooners’ loss to BYU.

They were so busy trying to figure out how to defeat the Bengals without simultaneously allowing an Idaho State triumph that they completely forgot there was a game to play.

Unfortunately, even if Stoops somehow has crafted a formula for success this Saturday, Idaho State has already left their permanent mark upon Sooner football history: that ‘L’ next to Sept. 5.