Victory in '85 marked Miami's arrival as college football beast

Here's when you knew tremors rippled under Owen Field during the 1985 Oklahoma-Miami game, when you knew that football history was altered right before our very eyes.

Not when Vinny Testaverde threw that 56-yard touchdown pass to Michael Irvin that sparked Miami's 27-14 upset. Not when Jerome Brown sacked Troy Aikman into a broken ankle. Not when OU's reins were handed to little Jamelle Holieway.

Football's course veered when Miami fullback Alonzo Highsmith popped Sooner linebacker Brian Bosworth and knocked The Boz to the ground. Highsmith "stood over the top of (Bosworth) and said something to him that I can't repeat,” said then-Miami coach Jimmy Johnson.

Under that October sky, America saw the birth of a football culture. The Boz was brawny and brash and blessed with great talent. But here came a whole team of Bosworths. Irvin and Brown and the Blades brothers and Highsmith and a host of other epic Miami players who commandeered college football's villain role and started a reign of terror.

"I can remember Melvin Bratton and Alonzo giving Brian Bosworth fits with all the talking,” said Bennie Blades, a great safety on those Johnson teams. "It was a fun rivalry. I'm glad they're bringing that back.”

OU and Miami resume that storied series with a game Saturday at Owen Field. The Sooners seem the likely victor; they also seemed the likely victor in 1985.

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