After an hour and a half rain delay, the Sooners and Red Raiders finally kicked off from Norman Saturday night. The brief thunderstorm that rolled through Norman right around game time turned out to be a perfect symbol for the game.
It was a perfect storm of injuries, lack of execution and familiar mistakes finally catching up to the then No. 3 team in the country as Texas Tech pulled off the 41-38 upset to end Oklahoma’s 39-game home winning streak.
Texas Tech’s offense set the tempo of the game early. After receiving the opening kick, it took the Red Raiders only four plays to score as junior receiver Alex Torres took a flat pass from junior quarterback Seth Doege 44 yards to the house to give Tech a 7-0 lead less than two minutes into the game. OU would respond, though. After sophomore running back Roy Finch scampered 55 yards on the Sooners’ first play from scrimmage, junior quarterback Landry Jones found sophomore receiver Kenny Stills for a 15-yard touchdown reception to tie things up.
However, what briefly looked to be a shootout quickly turned into a beating. The two teams were deadlocked at seven at the end of the first quarter. That was as close as the Sooners would ever be. Texas Tech took control in the second and never looked back. The defense continued to get torched for long gains all night, and the offense struggled to find any kind of a rhythm. Coach Bob Stoops called the loss a complete beating.
“They really whipped us in every part of the game,” Stoops said. “I told the players after the game that we were definitely outcoached and outplayed.”
Sophomore linebacker Tom Wort and junior defensive tackle Casey Walker were both out with injuries. However, the biggest loss may have been senior cornerback Jamell Fleming. The Red Raiders exploited that weakness and hit the Sooners with four passes of 20 yards or more in the second quarter alone. Tech added two touchdowns and a field goal in the second quarter, while Oklahoma’s offense failed to convert a single first down. That is easily a first for the Sooners this season.
Texas Tech entered halftime with a comfortable 24-7 lead against the No. 3-ranked team in the nation in a hostile environment. The one bright spot for Oklahoma was the fact that the Sooners were receiving to start the second half. A scoring drive would have put them right back in the thick of things. Tech had other plans, however.
The Sooners were forced into a quick three-and-out after an uncharacteristic drop by senior All-American receiver Ryan Broyles on third-and-ten. Texas Tech then picked up right where it left off when Doege hit receiver Marcus Kennard for a 40-yard completion, scoring in just over a minute to make the score 31-7. Senior linebacker and captain Travis Lewis said the opening of the second half really deflated the Sooners.
“Any time your offense goes three-and-out and then the other team goes right down on your defense and scores, it’s like being punched in the gut,” Lewis said. “It’s something we’re not accustomed to.”
Even down 31-7 with no momentum, the Sooners were not yet out of the game. OU did not have a 39-game home win streak for nothing, and the team was not about to go down without a fight. The defense finally started getting some stops, and after struggling for most of the game, the offense found a rhythm. The Sooners responded on the next drive when Jones found Stills sprinting down the sideline for a 59-yard touchdown.
Oklahoma finally showed signs of life. However, two common weaknesses, goal line offense and special teams, ultimately doomed the Sooners in this contest. After two consecutive stops by the defense, OU drove down the field to a first-and-goal from the five-yard line. After two stuffed runs and an incomplete pass, freshman Mike Hunnicutt was called on to kick the 22-yard field goal. The score was now 31-17 with just over three minutes to go in the third. The Sooners, though, finally seemed to have captured the momentum.
That is, Oklahoma had momentum until Tech received the ball again. The Red Raiders scored on yet another long fade route to once again take control. This was a common thread during the game. Oklahoma defenders said Tech was not doing anything special. They simply executed; Oklahoma didn’t.
“They came out, and they flat out beat us,” senior defensive end Frank Alexander said. “It wasn’t anything special they did.”
As bad as Oklahoma played for the majority of the game, the team stepped up and gave itself a chance to win in the fourth. The Sooners rallied to make the score 41-31 with plenty of time left. Then, after another clutch defensive stop, the offense drove to the red zone. That is when the two all too familiar chinks in the Sooner armor showed up again. After failing to punch the ball in, Hunnicutt, who had already missed one field goal earlier in the game, banged the football off of the right goalpost keeping the deficit at ten.
Landry Jones was able to orchestrate one more scoring drive to pull within three, but with just over a minute left on the clock, the Sooners had to try an onside kick. The Red Raiders recovered and ran out the clock, finishing off one of the biggest upsets of the season. The defense never could get consistent stops, and by the time the offense put things together, the game was already out of hand.
“We had a chance late to have a chance to win,” Stoops said. “It was too little too late to put ourselves in the hole the way we did.”
It is easy to point to the inefficiency in the red zone and the two missed field goals as reasons why the Sooners lost. Indeed, those two factors played a major part. However, this was a team loss. The defense allowed 572 yards, receivers had multiple drops, and Landry Jones, though he threw for over 400 yards and five touchdowns, missed a lot of open targets.
Travis Lewis, though disappointed with the way his team played, said that this is when the team’s true character will show.
“Every team is going to deal with adversity, and it’s the good teams that deal with it best,” Lewis said. “So, hopefully we’ve got strong guys that are going to deal with it the right way.”
The No. 9-ranked Sooners do not have to wait long to test their resilience. Oklahoma heads to Manhattan, Kan on Saturday, Oct. 29 to take on the No. 8-ranked Kansas State Wildcats.
