While Faster Nation would like the massive trophy — the a single that Oklahoma mentor Lincoln Riley calls the “tall, skinny one” — Riley does not want everyone to lose sight of the initially actual step toward that aim.
Winning a different Significant 12 Convention championship.
That campaign begins in earnest this 7 days as the No. 4-ranked Sooners host West Virginia in their Massive 12 opener.
OU (3-) is performing on an unparalleled run of six straight Large 12 titles. When the Sooners began this present run in 2015, Bob Stoops was however the head coach, Kyler Murray was continue to at Texas A&M, and Artwork Briles, Invoice Snyder, Charlie Sturdy, Dana Holgorsen, Kliff Kingsbury, Paul Rhoads and David Beaty have been roaming the sidelines.
No. 2-rated TCU and No. 4 Baylor have been the frustrating preseason favorites to gain the league title. OU was picked 3rd.
Which is how a great deal the league has changed in just the previous 6 seasons.
It looks the only factor that hasn’t modified is who gets the trophy at the close of the year.
And when they’ve surely come to be the norm and even just about a minimum expectation, Riley doesn’t want everyone to think successful a convention championship is passe.
“It’s 1 of all those points, by way of the several years, that can be taken for granted,” Riley stated on Thursday. “It’s so dang tough to gain a convention championship. We’ve experienced so quite a few other good teams in this league, good gamers, fantastic coaching staffs. I assume often all over here it will get taken for granted — and it should not, for the reason that it is so freaking really hard.”
Riley explained when he was employed by Stoops to repair the offense, the program’s purpose was to recapture the Major 12 flag as before long as attainable. It had been given that 2012 — a three-year extend, the longest without having a Quicker championship since Stoops’ 2000 team won the entire detail.
“That was action No. 1, obtaining back again to acquire Big 12 championships like (Stoops) had done so usually and these groups prior to experienced finished so usually,” Riley claimed. “The league was really very good that calendar year. There was a ton of expertise, specifically offensively. We had some barn-burner games throughout that schedule. That was a significant step, just that yr. There was a ton of emphasis on profitable that.”
In the composition of higher education football, it is exceptional to get a shot at the nationwide championship devoid of profitable a convention championship first. The SEC has done it a pair occasions, but no other league wields that kind of clout to carry a runner-up into the championship postseason.
So, in the Big 12, a vacation to the Faculty Football Playoff operates by means of Arlington, TX.
Certain, it’s been 21 years since OU’s final nationwide championship. And in 2021, that is absolutely on the team’s to-do checklist. The lover base is starved for an eighth crown.
But major goals are most proficiently accomplished via smaller targets. That indicates a renewed emphasis on a seventh straight Major 12 title.
“Those who have been in the fight just about every 12 months see that,” Riley claimed. “They’ve unquestionably discovered that variety of regard receiving back in the league and the respect you even have at OU when you sense like you need to be in the middle of it just about every yr — that respect that you have for the teams that have been equipped to do it, since it’s been really tricky.”
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