MIAMI — Oklahoma thought this was the year when everything came together in January. It had run the marathon of the season, believing it would finally peak at the end.

Thursday night at Dolphin Stadium, another season came crashing down with a 24-14 loss to Florida in the BCS national championship game.

The loss wouldn’t be so hard to stomach if it didn’t follow a familiar pattern to a tee.

The Sooners, for the third straight season, waited until the end to do the things they hadn’t done all season.

“We didn’t end up finishing like we talked about all week,” defensive tackle Gerald McCoy said.

All year would be more like it.

All year long OU had been three things:

• The best red zone team in college football.

• The most explosive offense in the game.

• A team with a shaky defense capable of giving up a lot of yards and points.

The Sooners were none of those things Thursday night.

Florida (13-1) won the game in the red zone. It scored on every trip. Quarterback Tim Tebow threw for 231 yards and a pair of touchdowns. He also rushed for 109.

The Sooners (12-2) couldn’t stop the Gators once they got inside the 20. All 24 of their points came inside the red zone.

“We had some opportunities to make a difference in the first half, and came up short,” OU coach Bob Stoops said.

Twice OU had the ball inside of Florida’s 6-yard line and didn’t come away with a single point. Chris Brown, who rushed for 110 yards, was stuffed on a fourth-and-goal from the Gator 1 midway through the second half. Sam Bradford, who threw for 256 yards and a pair of touchdown passes to Jermaine Gresham, was picked off late in the second quarter from the Florida 6.