For about three hours Saturday, Oklahoma appeared to leave all its problems behind against Iowa State.

Its maligned defense was back in dominant form, while quarterback Paul Thompson was firing strikes all over Owen Field. Even the Sooners’ only constant — running back Adrian Peterson — wasn’t having any problems finding room to run.

It amounted to a convincing 34-9 victory over the Cyclones and one the 23rd-ranked Sooners should have been able to relish.

They improved to 4-2 overall and 1-1 in the Big 12 Conference. The penalties and turnovers that plagued them the previous week were nearly non-existent.

OU didn’t have a turnover and committed only three penalties.

But there was little to celebrate Saturday afternoon. The announcement Peterson had broken his collarbone and would miss, at minimum, the rest of the regular season, hung over OU like a storm cloud Saturday afternoon.

“It’s a huge loss for the team,” wide receiver Malcolm Kelly said after catching two touchdown passes.

Winning seemed to be far from OU’s mind.

But that’s what they did against the Cyclones (3-4, 0-3).

Peterson rushed for 183 yards and capped his day with a 53-yard touchdown run to seal the win. Thompson threw for 195 yards and was 16-for-27. He was a Jason White-like 14-for-17 in the first half.

The Sooner defense dominated throughout, holding the Cyclones to 238 yards and harassing quarterback Bret Meyer into two interceptions.

“When you play as hard as we have, good things are going to happen,” OU defensive tackle Carl Pendleton said. “We have been close all season, and we saw improvement today.”

Meyer threw for 149 yards, but was also sacked three times.

A lot of his yards came on one first-quarter drive. He hit Austin Flynn for 37 yards and found Todd Blythe for a 31-yard touchdown late in first quarter.

Other than that one possession, OU dominated on both sides of the ball.