EUGENE, Ore. — The jury’s still out.And it will be as long as anybody can open a game against these Sooners by going 76 yards in four plays, or as long OU can give back a gift-wrapped interception, then blow a trio of tackles to allow a four-play, 76-yard march before thousands of fans had even taken their seat.

And it will stay out just as long as that same defense allows anybody to go up and down the field, almost from start to finish.

Saturday afternoon, Oregon picked up 6.8 yards per snap, quarterback Dennis Dixon threw for 341 yards and there were times Jonathan Stewart, who ran for 146 yards, seemed to be picking up acres at a time …

Well, that was going to be the column.

The next line was going to be something about how, even for all of that, even for giving up 501 total yards and settling for so many field goals despite taking over first and goal so many times, that this team, these Sooners, had heart.

That you could question their ability but not their drive or their character or any of those intangibles that turned a game that had loss written all over it into a win.

Well, the Sooners still have heart and character and all those intangibles and that’s why they’ll probably hammer Middle Tennessee and give Texas all it wants.

So that stuff still stands.

But it’s not the lesson.

The lesson is that heart and drive and character aren’t enough.

Because they didn’t win.

Enough is starting first-and-goal at the 3 and getting seven points instead of three with 6:46 to play and enough is starting first-and-goal at the 7 and getting six points instead of three with 3:12 left to play.

And maybe, just maybe, it’s going for six and not even chancing the three with 3:12 left to play because what good was the three anyway? Give up two touchdowns and you’re still beat.

Or how about not rushing Paul Martinez’s second-quarter at-the -buzzer 48-yard field goal that was only good after inching over the line and kicking off the crossbar.

“A lot of little things add up to something like this away from home,” Sooner coach Bob Stoops said. “There’s a lot of good in it, but not enough.”