Oklahoma-Iowa State: One Big Thing

Winning games — at this point, nine of them — and getting to bowl practices in December are the only things that can save this season, starting Saturday at Iowa State.

AMES, IA — What Trevor Knight said on his podcast two weeks ago was not popular among Sooner Nation, but it wasn’t really far from the truth:

It’s a lost season for Oklahoma.

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One thing can change that, of course: winning football games. All of them.

“This team will be remembered for how we finish,” coach Brent Venables said. “At 4-3 right now, that's in the rearview mirror. That's in the past. I can't do anything about what's taken place previously, but moving forward right where our feet are right now, we have an opportunity to change the ending. So that's what we're focused on.”

Three losses is not something Oklahoma fans will ever settle for. But that’s where the program is in 2022. Four losses would be a dismal failure. Five, a disaster. Six, a disgrace.

But a losing record? Inconceivable as that may sound to the fan base, it’s on the table. And that would mean no bowl game, and no bowl practices, and whatever growth Venables established in the spring and again in training camp would be greatly diminished. Winning programs use those bowl practices to get better — so they can keep winning. It perpetuates itself.

Forget the actual bowl game. Not having 15 extra bowl practices would be a major setback for Venables and where he wants the program to go.

That’s why Saturday is enormous for the Sooners.

Beating last-place Iowa State — something Lincoln Riley struggled with, something the Sooners couldn’t do in 2020 in Ames for the first time in 60 years — would make Oklahoma 5-3 on the season and 2-3 in Big 12 play. That’s one win away from bowl eligibility, and one win away from a .500 record in conference games.

Given the Sooners’ difficult finishing stretch — Baylor next week in Norman, West Virginia in Morgantown, OSU in Norman and Texas Tech in Lubbock — OU needs to pile up wins wherever they can.

That has to start Saturday in Ames.

“Got a five-game stretch here, very challenging,” Venables said. “The challenge for our guys is to finish with no regrets. We have an opportunity to win every game and certainly, we could lose every game. It's gonna take everybody being completely, totally committed to doing their best. And it's not gonna be easy.”