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March 19, 2013

Sooners suffer twin tragedies from national championship teams

By John Shinn The Norman Transcript

NORMAN — The death of former Oklahoma quarterback Steve Davis Sunday marked the second of distinguished player from those 1974 and 1975 national championship teams in the last 18 months. Lee Roy Selmon died in September of 2011.

Running back Joe Washington was in the backfield along with Davis for all those victories.

OU held reunions for all its national championship teams in 2011 and many of the players from those teams came back to Norman for it. You could see the bond they still shared.

The Sooners went 32-1-1 from 1973-75 and won national titles the last two seasons. It was truly one of the golden ages of OU football.

“We were all lucky that we were here at a special time with unbelievable people, players and outstanding coaches,” Washington said. “It was also a time when everyone in the athletic dorms were essentially family. You spent most of your time together and it was another ingredient that made us better. We were close. We were real close. We spent all our time together because we lived in the dorm. We knew what was going on. For the most part, we had a tendency to care more about each other because when somebody was going through something everybody knew what it was. Everyone understood he was going through something and guys were there for you.”

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