By Clay Horning, Sports Editor
What’s going to happen?A year ago, we kind of thought we knew, if only because Bob Stoops made sure to remind everybody that heading into the 2005 season seemed a lot like heading into the 2000 season.
For the first time in a long time, there were no heavy expectations, and, one could carry the logic out, perhaps the latest set of Sooners could thrive in a similar fashion to the last set of Sooners to enter a season so under the radar.
The amazing thing about it was Stoops was half right. Even after beginning the season with three losses in five games, casting Paul Thompson out to wide receiver and opting to live with the bungles and potential that was Rhett Bomar, OU really was a very good time by the end of the season, with a victory over Oregon, the likely owner of the biggest BCS beef, at the Holiday Bowl.
Then again, the half he got wrong, the first half, may have been the only thing that mattered. By the time the Sooners played like they belonged the dreams of the Sooner Nation had already died.
So here we are, the beginning of a new season, with all of last season’s lessons still fresh, against UAB, a program just ready to win a game like the one it will play tonight at Owen Field.
Everybody says the Sooners have the urgency that was missing the last time around. Everybody says they haven’t forgotten what just a little complacency can do to a team. And yet hears the thing.
Nobody knows.
Media and fans have been barred from practice for more than three weeks, and yet the Sooners themselves can hardly be certain on the topic of what will happen today against UAB.
“We just want to go out there and perform to the best of our ability,” linebacker Zach Latimer said. “It’s not just one person, but it’s everybody performing their best.”
That’s great, but hardly a prediction, which is what Latimer was asked for. He did say there had been “a lot less yelling” during practice, so maybe the Sooners were picking things up. Of course, games are not practice.
There’s been turnover in the secondary. All the defensive ends are back, but many haven’t played in a year, and there’s this little matter of Paul Thompson playing quarterback, the tumult that put him there, and whatever wrinkles Kevin Wilson may have designed to take better advantage of Thompson’s athleticism.
Of course, everybody has confidence in Thompson. Also, nobody knows.
“I think we’re going to play really well,” Wilson said. “But as young as they are and before the bullets start to fly, I think it’s pretty much a guess.”
And that’s from the offensive coordinator.
Center Jon Cooper likely spoke for every Sooner when he, out of character for many a coach and player, attacked the quarterback situation head on. Because it’s not like the Sooners don’t think about it, though the important thing may be how they think about it.
“We’ve got a lot of stuff to prove. We really don’t want to be an average 8-4 team,” he said. “We want to win a Big 12 championship.”
And then, on the quarterbacks …
“We don’t want to be a team that’s remembered for controversy. We want to be the kind of team that overcomes something like that.”
Well, the Sooners certainly have that chance.
Thompson could do it all by himself, though that seems unlikely, particularly the first night of the season. Peterson could get all those carries Stoops has talked about, and if Thompson does anything, 200 yards before the nation’s best running back ever catches a pass could be the norm. And if the defense plays like Brent Venables and Bobby Jack Wright think it might, with a dominance unseen of late, none of that offensive stuff may even matter.
But that’s just a bunch of possibilities.
Heading in, nobody really knows.
Clay Horning366-3526cfhorning@normantranscript.com
