Players didn’t want to talk about it. Coaches considered it a taboo subject as well. But Oklahoma is toting a new moniker. After Saturday night’s 35-10 victory over TCU, the Sooners are college football’s No. 1 team.
They received 43 of a possible 65 first-place in the Associated Press Top 25 released Sunday. The coaches were more impressed, giving the Sooners 57 of 61 first-place nods.
Few were impressed.
“We’re not even paying attention to the No. 1 ranking. We don’t really care,” defensive tackle Gerald McCoy said Saturday. “We appreciate it if it happens but we’re just going to keep preparing as if we’re not ranked at all.”
Focus on the process and let the results fall where they may. It’s something players have been talking about all season. They gained a solid understanding of how much the college football season can fluctuate last season. OU spent much of the year in the top five, but suffered two losses each time when the top spot was within grasp.
Most thought 2007 was an aberration in terms of wackiness. Being No. 1 was like wearing a 200-pound suit in a swim meet. Just about every team that carried the moniker sunk.
The same is holding true this season. OU will be the third team to sit atop the poll in just five weeks. Georgia held it in the preseason, let it slip by struggling in two early-season wins and was knocked from the top 10 with Saturday’s loss to Alabama. USC wore the label over the last next three weeks, but its stunning loss to unranked Oregon State Thursday night dropped it to No. 9.
Stoops said he doesn’t have to use the Bulldogs’ and Trojans’ misfortunes as examples. The players are well enough informed on their own.
“I talked about it immediately after the game,” he said. “Obviously you look at some of these other games and you see what’s happening. If you’re not on top of your game and not really ready to go, you’re going to get beat. I don’t care who it is against. That didn’t just start happening that way this year, it happens every year.”
If there’s any program that can handle the weight of the top spot, it’s OU. Sunday marked the 96th time it’s been ranked No. 1 in the AP poll. No other program has been there more often. OU had been tied at 95 with Notre Dame.
Staying there is going to be very difficult. The Big 12 could do some major chest beating Sunday, too.
The conference has four teams ranked in the top seven with Missouri (No. 4), Texas (No. 5) and Texas Tech (No. 7) trailing the Sooners. Kansas (No. 16) and Oklahoma State (No. 21) puts half the league’s teams in the Top 25.
OU (4-0) travels to Baylor Saturday. But games with the Longhorns and Jayhawks follow. It faces OSU in the regular-season finale and a potential meeting with Missouri could be in the Big 12 championship game.
Being No. 1 doesn’t mean much unless that road is successfully navigated.
“We’ve still got a long way to go before we even think about where we’re ranked in the polls,” quarterback Sam Bradford said. “Right now, it pretty much doesn’t mean anything, so we’re going to take it one game at a time and we’re going to get ready to go play Baylor next week.”
John Shinn366-3536jshinn@normantranscript.com
OU Sports
Sooners back at No. 1
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