Oklahoma Sends off Bob Stoops With an Alamo Bowl Rout
SAN ANTONIO — Bob Stoops saved Oklahoma again.
Twenty-three years after breathing new life into a dead program, Stoops reached into the darkness left behind by Lincoln Riley’s sudden and shocking departure and pulled the Sooners into a promising future.
It was just one game, but Wednesday night’s Alamo Bowl underscored Stoops’ first and lasting legacy at OU: No excuses. None whatsoever.
Anyway, who needs Lincoln Riley and Alex Grinch with coordinators like Cale Gundy and Brian Odom calling plays?
The No. 16-ranked Sooners were both artfully masterful and physically dominant over No. 14 Oregon in a 47-32 victory inside the Alamodome.
Afterward, Stoops got his first Gatorade bath since 2016, then passed the ceremonial torch -- his visor this time -- to incoming head coach Brent Venables.
"Yeah, it was great," Stoops said. "I loved the beginning. I kind of – you get addicted to the to the anxiety and the excitement of playing and not knowing what's going to happen, you know, coming out on the field and getting ready for it. I missed it. I missed that energy.
"And and then, you know, once you're in it, you're fighting your way through it. And that was fun. And yeah, yeah, it is fun when it's over. You can take your headset off and enjoy the moment, you know? So it was it was fun. It was exciting."
Like Oklahoma (11–2), the Ducks’ two-deep was depleted by injuries, opt-outs and other issues, but the way Caleb Williams, Kennedy Brooks, Marvin Mims and the OU offensive line played, it might not have mattered if the Ducks had projected first-round draft pick Kayvon Thibodeaux and two starting defensive backs in the lineup. And the way a reshuffled Oklahoma defense played, it probably wouldn’t have made a difference if Oregon’s offense was at full strength either.
And like Oklahoma, Oregon (10-4) also was dealing with a change of the guard at the top: head coach Mario Cristobal picked up and went home to coach his alma mater, the Miami Hurricanes.
But where Oregon inserted receivers coach Bryan McClendon into the interim head coaching post — he was 1-0 as a head coach, with a 2015 bowl victory at Georgia in an interim role — OU countered with Stoops.
Owner of 190 career victories, 10 Big 12 Conference championships, a national title, victories in every New Year’s Day bowl and a spot accorded just this month into the College Football Hall of Fame, Stoops laid his hands on a hurting OU program and brought it safely into the Brent Venables era.
His immediate contribution when athletic director Joe Castiglione literally called him off the golf course on Nov. 29—Stoops had spent the previous five years as Joe C’s “special assistant”—was to soothe the heartache and fury over Riley’s unexpected departure for USC.
Stoops calmed the current players — those who chose to stay, anyway — and then went to work patching up the 2022 recruiting class.
"It's been an up-and-down roller coaster," Williams said in the postgame press conference, his first public appearance since summer of 2020. "All my guys have been through it. We were all shocked. We were all hit at the same time, same moment. So that's that's how it's been up and down. We lost a lot of coaches. And we have, you know, a legend that comes back (in Stoops)."
Within a week, Venables was hired, and Stoops quickly refocused on being a head coach again in the Alamo Bowl, a game that added a win back in his ledger that was stolen by Pac-10 Conference officials in a controversial 34-33 loss to the Ducks in Eugene way back in 2006.
That one was a close game all the way, but there was an obvious talent mismatch this time. Even more pronounced was the teams’ difference in attitude—at least in the decisive first half. Oklahoma was sharp and motivated. Oregon was not.
Brooks rushed for 127 yards and two touchdowns on 10 carries in the first half alone. Caleb Williams was 12-of-17 for 129 yards with two touchdown passes before halftime—including a 55-yard masterstroke to Mims—and added a third TD throw to open the third quarter.
Williams’ other touchdown throw in the first half went to Drake Stoops, which stirred the OU-partisan crowd of 59,121 into a wild frenzy and set off a Stoops family celebration on the sideline that included twin brother Isaac, who’s now a student assistant coach.
It was Stoops’ 191st career victory and raises his winning percentage from .798 to .799.
Williams finished 21-of-27 for 242 yards with three touchdowns. Brooks gained 142 yards and three TDs on just 14 carries. Gray led the Sooners with five catches for 25 yards and also added 82 rushing yards on eight carries, including a season-long 48 yards.
The Ducks showed life in the second half, including a 22-point third quarter in which quarterback Anthony Brown found Dont’e Thornton behind D.J. Graham for a 66-yard touchdown and Kris Hutson behind Woodi Washington for a 34-yard score.
Caleb Williams hooked up with Eric Gray on a 6-yard touchdown pass, and Brooks added an 8-yard TD run to keep the Ducks at bay. Gabe Brkic—who in the first quarter missed his first career extra point—added a 29-yard fourth-quarter field goal to his 40-yarder in the second quarter to extend the OU lead back to 47-25 with 8:56 to play.
Brown added another 30-yard bomb to Troy Franklin over Graham with 6:46 to go.
Oregon running back Travis Dye rushed for 153 yards and a TD on 18 carries and Brown completed 27-of-40 passes for 306 yards and three touchdowns.
