With eyes on a championship, OU must now refocus

So Oklahoma is on to Iowa State.

On Thursday, for the second time in three weeks, the Sooners’ game at West Virginia was shut down by COVID problems. Two weeks ago, it was OU that struggled with positive tests and contact tracing and had to shut down the program. This time, it was West Virginia that had to pause all activities.

Lincoln Riley said halfway through practice, he got word that the game was off. He stopped practice, told his team, cut the players loose and the coaching staff went back inside and started planning Friday’s practice for the Cyclones — OU’s opponent in the Big 12 Championship Game on Dec. 19.

“It is what it is,” Riley said. “I mean, we can't control it at this point, so we're not gonna worry about things that we can't control.”

OU could control things the last time the Sooners played Iowa State, but only for about 53 minutes.

Oklahoma lost 37-30 in Ames back on Oct. 3. That loss dropped the Sooners to 0-2 in conference play for the first time since 1998. OU has regrouped nicely, winning six in a row and getting back to the title game for the fourth consecutive year.

But that game remains a bitter pill.

OU led the regular-season matchup 17-6 in the second quarter that night at Jack Trice Stadium, and the Sooners took a 30-23 lead midway through the fourth quarter. But Breece Hall and Brock Purdy and the rest of Matt Campbell’s upstart team scored the last 14 points and beat the Sooners in Ames for the first time since 1960.

Oklahoma's last two possessions ended in a three-and-out and a Spencer Rattler interception, while the Sooners gave up a big return on special teams, a 55-yard drive on defense and two easy touchdowns.

Now Iowa State will have two full weeks to prep for the title game, but OU will have just eight days.

“That was a little bit of the unfortunate part,” Riley said Thursday. “ … We've had a really good week of work (on West Virginia), which, I think a lot of that'll carry over.”

Riley said Thursday’s practice was just a walk-through anyway, but it was “100 percent geared toward West Virginia.” He also compared this week’s shutdown to the one two weeks ago, saying he felt like his team was making good progress — especially after the offense struggled some against Baylor on Dec. 5.

“This is way different than a couple of weeks ago when this happened and we had to shut down,” he said. “I mean, this is a totally different scenario. We've really had some good work, really some strong practices the last couple of days. … Just made some big improvements, just generally as a football team, kind of regardless of opponent.

“So, a lot of that certainly will carry over. I'm proud of the work and we're not going to be disappointed. We're not gonna hold our heads down. We knew this was part of the deal coming into the season and we're excited about what's next.”

Two shocking losses and a no-contest with WVU ensures OU (7-2 overall, 6-2 Big 12) will have one significant streak broken this season: for the last five seasons — every year Riley has been in Norman — the Sooners have double-digit wins (11, 11, 12, 12 and 12). At this point, the Sooners can win no more than nine games. That's no fun for a program that leads all of college football in 10-win seasons with 40.

Now only one thing can keep Oklahoma’s streak of five straight Big 12 championships alive: beating Iowa State at AT&T Stadium. OU opened as a 5-point favorite.

With ISU (8-2 overall, 8-1 Big 12) owning the Big 12 regular season title (they have a better conference record and beat the Sooners head-to-head), if the game doesn’t get played, then Campbell’s crew will bring home the Cyclones’ first conference championship since 1912.

That means one more week of diligence with COVID protocol, one more week of social distancing, one more week of wearing masks and washing hands, etc — and one more week of hoping the opponent doesn't cancel.

“We will certainly have to be careful, no doubt about that,” Riley said. “If there is any benefit not having to get on our longest airplane ride of the year and travel to do all that as far as the West Virginia game, I guess that is a potential benefit there.

“Yeah, I don’t know if we’ll emphasize it more. Every game is so important to us. I mean, I can’t sit here and say this game is any more important than any of the others, because if you don’t win the others you ain’t even in this game. We’ve been in a bunch of these. We love playing and coaching in them. But I can’t sit here and say I love it more than just a tough non-conference regular season game on the road. They’re all important. They all matter.

“In that vein, we’ve emphasized it like crazy to our players all year. That won’t stop. But I don’t know all of a sudden we’re going to do something on it that we haven’t already been doing.”

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