There’s no doubt there exists a contingent of Oklahoma fans who judge success on what happens in the Red River Rivalry. To that group, Saturday’s 28-10 loss to the Longhorns leaves a bitter taste that won’t go away.

OU tumbled from No. 14 to No. 23 in the latest Associated Press Top 25. Any national championship hopes are also gone.

But the Sooners, themselves, realize they haven’t even reached the midway point in a long season. Sunday, they quickly turned their attention to what remains.

“They understand they’re in it for the long haul and we have a long season,” Sooner coach Bob Stoops said. “We didn’t just work this whole time just to be in a position to play Texas. Though it’s an important game, we understand they all are when we get into league play.

“We understand what the schedule is and our guys are about that. They’re about the whole year and not one game.”

It’s good OU has something else to think about other than what happened at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas.

The Sooners committed five turnovers and were flagged for 11 costly penalties. To make matters worse, the they led 10-7 at halftime and appeared to have the game in their grasp.

It was a disappointing performance.

“The turnovers, you can’t have,” Stoops said. “To me, once you possess the football you cannot fumble. You can’t win when you put the ball on the ground. We have to do a better job finishing with the football.

“I thought the discipline — penalty wise — hurt us. The things that stopped us offensively were the penalties and the turnovers. We have to be able to do that.”

If the Sooners can, there’s plenty to salvage.

Texas (5-1, 2-0 Big 12) is the odds-on favorite to win the Big 12 South now. The winner of the Red River Rivalry has done that six of the last seven years.

But the only reason it isn’t seven straight years was because Texas was able to put its 2001 loss to OU behind it and remain in the race.

The remainder of the schedule was already on the Sooners’ minds before they left Dallas.

“Starting Monday, we have to put this behind us right away,” safety Nic Harris said after the game. “We learned things from this game we can take with us the rest of the season. You can’t let this defeat cost us another game by not putting it behind us.”