I remember a couple of huge upset losses to KU (though 10 years apart) and OU still won the championship and made a run at the championship in the other year losing to KU. Colorado has for the most part always plays the Sooners tough at home. We're lucky to have Stoops.

I started to sit down and comment on this article, but whats the use. So many holes in the point spread and losses, its not even worth wasting keystrokes on. But for all of you that cannot remember the Switzer years..the on and on years, maybe you have forgot about the rapes in the atheletic dorms, drug sales arrests... weapons in the dorms...and on and on and on. Bob Stoops has brought back the winning program that all us older fans remember with much class. You now have players assisting in the neighborhoods. Helping provide food and support to those in need, while all the time winning football games. For those who think its just not enough, the only place I know that has been more productive over the past few years is SC, so like the days of the dust bowl...load you mattress on the top of your car and head west. But do keep in mind... SC even loses a game now and then... Safe trip guys.

Bob Stoop is certainly a good head coach but the off. coordinator is questionable.

Stupid, inexplainable losses happen to every program and every coach. Switzer certainly had his share, too. That said, when Bob & Co. win on Saturday, OU is still in the drivers seat for the South and an opportunity to play for a big (weak) XII championship. It's great to be in control of your own destiny and not have to rely on help to attain your goals.

BOOMER
PLaw

Thank's for sharing John hope you enjoyed it as much as we all enjoyed you reminding us.How about you and Jenny have lunch and think hope some more great stories for us to read.Coach Stoops would never stoop to either of your levels.

As a long time Sooner Fan: 44 years, I very much appreciate Coach Stoops and the job he is doing! Keep up the good work Bob! Go Sooners !

Hey, John, you left out the 1999 season totals. Stoops is 90-20..

I think we all are getting too accustomed to OU winning games every Saturday. We can't win them all, and we have to give Colorado credit for playing hard to the very end. If Stoops were to announce tomorrow that he's leaving OU for the NFL, I think EVERYONE on this message board would be devastated. Besides the debacle against USC, we haven't been blown out in games like we did in the 90s when I was a student at OU. It wasn't fun watching our behind get kicked all up and down the field in Lincoln. I do not want to see us return to those embarrasing days. We have a gem of a coach here at OU and we should appreciate it.

You could write this article about any great coach. Switzer had one undefeated and untied season. Some of you are talking as if he never lost. He also had his embarrassing losses. The 78 orange bowl would have won him another NC, but they were blown out by a mediocre Arkansas team. A team that suspended four of their best players before the game. I think Stoops is a victim of his own success. Fans expect to win every game, but that is unrealistic.

Sooner fans are getting spoiled on all the success in recent years. Bob is a great coach, Sam is a young quarterback, and we just made some dumb mistakes, that hopefully will get fixed. Rarely do teams go unbeaten in a season.....

I agree with Ken, we have taken Bob Stoops winning for granted. I still can remember "John Blake" and man what a nightmare. I personnaly don't think 10 points is enough this weekend (OU favored) at least I hope not, as I bet the farm on OU....Go Sooners

Let's hope there is not another staggering setback this Saturday. The Sooners, hopefully, had a real wake up call at Colorado. Texas is a lot better and will have something to prove as well. GO SOONERS!!!

Steve Spurier has NEVER gone undefeated. Even Bobby Bowden has only done it once (FSU lost to ND during their '93 MNC run). This kind of thing happens to all of the great programs & coaches from time to time.

Only a few teams get mentioned every single year. Since 2000, OU has been one of them. I appreciate what Bob Stoops brings to the program. We get spoiled with the wins and that makes the losses hurt even more. I certainly don't want to go back to expecting them to lose every week.

Apparently we should have fired Switzer in '76.

All you OU Coach bashers need to read Terry Bowden's article on the Yahoo Sports page. OU is lucky to have a coach like Bob Stoops and his staff.

John, surely you can't call out everyone who has responded to this article. Bob is a great coach and I applaud his efforts. All I am saying is that OU is becoming the poster child for crumbling under pressure, as far as the rest of the country is concerned. What have we done in our last three BCS appearances? Flopped, that's what. We have the swagger, but we don't seem to bust out the ingenuity and show some razzle-dazzle. I know gadget plays aren't what champions win with, but it seems every time we bust out a trick play, it's against an already out-matched opponent. Some of the stuff Bob used to me known for doesn't seem to happen anymore. I realize, as does Sooner Nation, that losses will happen; heck the other guys are trying hard in games too. But the flops to CU and TCU and Boise, those HURT. We have the talent. The players need to start focusing and we need to hit the gas and win out. We need to win some "big" games.

Lloyd, if Mike Stoops was the reason for our success, why did half of the losses listed in the article occur while he was coaching our defense? Dont you remember all the deep passes we got burnt on?

You critics have no concept of football history. Bobby Bowden, the all time winningest coach in NCAA Div I-A history went FOURTEEN years straight ranked in the top 5! And how many national championships does he have? TWO! Joe Paterno has won more games against Div. I-A opponents than any other coach in history. How many national champs? TWO! Steve Spurrier averaged 10 wins a year in his twelve years at Florida and ranked in the top 15 every year. And how many National Champs? ONE! OU fans need to stop expecting a national championship every year and appreciate what an amazing run Bob Stoops has been on. We're an elite college program that competes for conference and national titles on a yearly basis. What more do you really want?

Everyone has these games. You can look at any great coach and they will have losses just as Bob Stoops. There are days that the other team lines up and has a better plan and let us not get so spoiled that we forget the days of John Blake, Howard Schellenberger and Gary Gibbs when winning is what we hoped for not what we expected. The fact is last year we won many big games. Please remember the Big Twelve Championship and that 99 yard drive. Please remember the game at A&M, Missouri on the road, Tech in Norman. Every year someone is highly touted and the mighty Sooners take them out. The Sooners over the past nine years of the Stoops era have won more big games then they have lost. The fact is these games are only big because of the Sooners. If we had won these games then no one would even remember most of them.

Eight years as the head football coach in Norman reveals Stoops to be neither "Budly" nor "Barryily", but rather "Chuckily". Lest folks forget the third member of the "great" coaching triad pre-1999, Charles Fairbanks had a penchant to the timely, albeit preventable loss. Id est, OU would HAVE WON a national championship in 1967 but for a two point loss in the Cotton Bowl against a less than stellar UT squad; OU would HAVE WON a national championship in 1971 but for the mediocre play of an average defensive unit [and a couple uncalled of clips on the famous Johnny R punt return in the first quarter] - this smacks of the LSU loss; OU would HAVE WON a national championship in 1972 but for the wrong selection of shoes at Colorado, with an unexpected 6 point loss to Eddie Crowder. In short, to remind OU's head coach of his patterns, perhaps fans should begin sporting bumper stickers touting either "Bobbie Fairbanks" or "Chuckie Stoops". The present coach is more on the level of Fairbanks' style than that of Bud or Barry.

the people that have rosponded are just as dumb as the guy who wrote this article. what have you done for me lately mentality. i guess bob gets no credit for going 11-3 big 12 champs with a reciever at qb.

wow, i finally agree with all of the statements i've read thus far... big-game-bob's move to play-it-safe-bob is finally being realized by the sooner nation. it's time to stop blaming the coordinator's and facing the fact that, while ole bob is a great media representative, he's gotten really comfortable in his loft...

Stoops is a great coach, but the "Big Game" tag is now just a memory. We haven't won a "big" game in awhile. I'm awfully disappointed in our players, though. With all the talent that we have, we should be making more plays.

Hate to keep saying it, but the defense and team hasn't had the same fire since Mike Stoops left for Arizona. They just don't have that swagger they had when he was coaching the defense. And yes, the mental lapses have been puzzling, especially in big games lately. On the other hand, find me one coach whose teams haven't had them.

As stated in a previous posting, suffering repeated upsets is the only thing I fault Coach Stoops for in his time at OU. Sometimes his teams simply seem to fall apart and be somewhere else mentally. But, he's won four conference championships and a national chaampionship so obviously he's doing much more right than wrong.

wonder if we can win the pressure games anymore????