Published October 14, 2007 12:45 am - OU was the beneficiary of four turnovers, Missouri of two and that’s a start but there’s more. One of those turnovers the Tigers got came on Juaquin Iglesias’ kick return a moment after Jeremy Maclin’s 10-yard dash brought Missouri within 23-17.
The very next play, Chase Daniel threw to a wide open Derrick Washington who promptly dropped a certain 46-yard touchdown. The Tigers scored seven snaps later but what if it had been 14 points on consecutive snaps? What then?
This time, Sooners lucky
Clay Horning
The Norman Transcript
Count Oklahoma among the lucky.
Put the Sooners on the good list, too.
But they’re lucky first. Or, better put, they might finish first because they’re lucky. Look no further than Saturday night at Owen Field for the required evidence.
Is Missouri OU’s superior?
No, the Sooners beat the Tigers. But they weren’t the only ones. The Tigers beat the Tigers, too.
“It was kind of an evening of mistakes,” said Missouri coach Gary Pinkel and he should know.
The final score was 41-31 and with everything else that’s happened in this twilight zone of a college football season OU might be on the inside track to the national championship game.
I’d vote South Florida No. 1. Find me two better wins than at Auburn and against West Virginia among the ranks of the unbeaten. But among the one-time losers, OU has to be right there with LSU and that’s very close.
Which only magnifies how lucky this team’s been.
It may not look like it.
Missouri took its only lead with 1:30 to play in the third quarter when Jimmy Jackson rumbled in from 4 yards and, just like that, stunned 85,041 into silence.
But, the drive chart would later prove, OU responded by going 66 yards and taking the lead for good when Chris Brown, the best running back for either team this day, went in from a yard.
Then Curtis Lofton brought back a fumble.
Then another turnover and another touchdown and darn if it didn’t look like one more rout for the home team but for the fact Charlie Brown and Lucy would have had better luck trying to kick a point after. And Missouri went on one more drive.
But the box score says OU responded.