Big Red Beatdown: Oklahoma Hammers Nebraska
LINCOLN — No Sooner Magic. No historic showdown.
Just an epic beatdown, a lopsided mismatch in a once-great rivalry.
No. 6-ranked Oklahoma battered and brutalized their old Big Red Rival Nebraska 49-14 on Saturday at Memorial Stadium.
It was Oklahoma's biggest win in Lincoln since a 48-0 blowout in 1949, and was the most points OU has ever scored on the Huskers in Lincoln.
The Huskers fired head coach Scott Frost on Sunday and absorbed his full, $15 million buyout, but that didn’t inspire the Huskers like many thought it would.
Nor did it dissuade the 3-0 Sooners from trampling the 1-3 Cornhuskers into the rich Nebraska soil.
As a player and as an assistant coach at Kansas State, new Sooners head coach Brent Venables took plenty of these types of beatings. Now he was on the winning end.
"Challenged our offense and defensive lines just as as a program, what we want to stand for, the DNA that we want to be known for, the identity that we want to be known for," Venables said.
Nebraska actually jumped to a quick 7-0 lead after forcing an OU punt and sliding Trey Palmer behind the defense for a 32-yard touchdown reception.
Then everything changed.
"Offense scored on seven of the first 10 drives," Venables said. "Defense came out and got punched in the face and responded after that. I think they had 77 yards on that first drive and then 71 yards the rest of the half to average just under two yards per play the rest of the half. So I'm glad that happened because I believe ... you develop through some failure and adversity, and that's how you grow and improve."
Down 7-0, it was OU quarterback Dillon Gabriel who may have broken the Huskers' spirit on the Sooners’ next possession with his second-down QB draw that turned into an unlikely 61-yard touchdown sprint. He bolted from the pocket, beat the pursuit down the sideline, then made a tackler miss at the 10-yard line — and Nebraska was finished.
“It was huge," Venables said, "and what sweet feet he had, too. "Who would have would have thought?"
Gabriel finished 16-of-27 passing for 230 yards before giving way to backup Davis Beville midway through the third quarter.
Jalil Farooq caught his first career touchdown, tight end Brayden Willis threw a TD pass to Marcus Major on a double-pass trick play, Eric Gray ran for more than 100 yards and two touchdowns (he averaged more than 10 yards per carry) and the OU defense tossed Huskers QB Casey Thompson around like a stuffed toy as the Sooners put together a complete victory.
Thompson completed 14-of-20 passes for 129 yards and a touchdown on the opening drive before he was lifted early in the third quarter for backup Chubba Purdy.
At halftime, the Sooners held a dominating 35-7 lead, and were up 355-to-148 in total offense.
Much of that was due to Oklahoma’s eight tackles for loss and four quarterback sacks in the first half.
Freshman linebacker Jaren Kanak — who replaced DaShaun White after White was ejected late in the first half for targeting — then opened the third quarter by stripping and recovering a fumble from wide receiver Palmer at the end of a 21-yard completion. Kanak ended up leading the Sooners with 10 tackles.
"He's just learning how to play linebacker," Venables said. "He has no idea what he's doing yet, but he's made a lot of improvement from fundamentals and the language and I know things are going a million miles an hour for him but he did a nice job."
Gray cashed that possession in for his second straight TD, a 21-yard sprint through the middle of the forlorn Husker defense for a 42-7 OU lead.
It was Gray who finished the first half much the same way, virtually untouched on a 15-yard TD right before halftime.
Playing with a lineup of mostly backups as the lead ballooned to 49-7 in the third quarter, Oklahoma committed its first turnover of the season on a botched handoff between Beville and Gavin Freeman.
OU historian Mike Brooks said last week that the Sooners hadn’t been turnover-free in their first two games to open a season since 1937.
