Five Questions – Oklahoma

By Steve Habel

With the Longhorns’ fan base stunned by the football team’s poor start and perceived lack of the improvement, along with national college football pundits opining that the job is too much for him to handle, head coach Charlie hasn’t slept well as of late.

On the morning of a do-or-die showdown against Oklahoma, Strong, tired of tossing and turning in his bed, headed for the hotel gym at 3:30 a.m. He then ran five miles on the treadmill.

The run wasn’t enough to quell the voices in his head. Strong took to the streets, opting for another jogging session around the hotel property, where he went unrecognized and uninterrupted.

“There’s not too many people running around out there at that time of the morning,” he explained. “I had things to myself and that’s what I needed.”

By the time he hit his 5:45 a.m. staff meeting, Strong had reaffirmed his belief that the Longhorns [s2If current_user_can(access_s2member_level1)] had the right stuff to produce a season-defining, turnaround game.

And the Longhorns came through.

Texas used a potent rushing attack and a stifling defense to stun the 10th-ranked Sooners 24-17 in the AT&T Red River Showdown at the Cotton Bowl. The game marked the 110th meeting between Texas and Oklahoma.

The victory was, without a doubt, the most important in Strong’s 19-game-and-growing tenure at the Longhorns’ helm.

Texas (2-4, 1-2 Big 12) salvaged what seemed to be a lost season by dominating in the trenches against the previously unbeaten Sooners.

“We were determined to run the ball — run it right at Oklahoma and control the line of scrimmage,” Strong said. “We were able to carry out that plan.

“This is a huge win because we know we’re better than what we’ve shown on the field,” he continued. “We needed to see evidence that the work we’re doing is making us a better team. We got a lot of things accomplished out there today, but getting the win was the most important thing.”

The Longhorns got 117 yards on the ground from running back D’Onta Foreman on just nine carries and 115 more from quarterback Jerrod Heard.

“We didn’t maintain leverage on Heard,” Oklahoma head coach Bob Stoops said. “When we had it, we missed tackles.

“We didn’t block well, didn’t cover well and didn’t protect the passer well,” he continued. “That’s really all you need to know.”

Texas passed for just 55 yards, 24 of which came on a shovel pass in the first quarter. Oklahoma (4-1, 1-1) had 278 yards, all but 85 in the second half.

The Longhorns sacked quarterback Baker Mayfield six times by using a combination of blitzes, a bull rush and a good push upfront from its interior defensive linemen and well disguised coverage.

“The plan today was to make [Mayfield] uncomfortable in the backfield and send extra players at Oklahoma to control the line, and it worked,” Texas linebacker Malik Jefferson said. “We needed to make a statement here today and we dominated a quality opponent. Winning — and winning like this — feels good.”

The Longhorns couldn’t have scripted a better first half for themselves. Texas scored two touchdowns in a 2:15 span of the first quarter.

First, wide receiver Marcus Johnson took the aforementioned shovel pass from Heard and sprinted around the edge, dodging Oklahoma tacklers along the way, and tightroped the sideline to complete a 24-yard scoring play.

The Sooners’ Alex Ross fumbled on the ensuing kickoff while being tackled by Texas’ Kevin Vaccaro and the Longhorns’ Kirk Johnson pounced on the loose ball on the Oklahoma 41-yard line.

Texas scored six snaps later as reserve quarterback Tyrone Swoopes, the former starter who has been repurposed as the Longhorns’ short-yardage specialist, rammed over two Oklahoma defenders at the goal line for a 3-yard touchdown run and a 14-0 Texas lead.

Oklahoma cut into the lead midway through the second quarter with a 12-play, 67-yard drive that ended with Austin Seibert’s 21-yard field goal.

The Longhorns’ much-maligned defense, which ranked 119th out of 128 FBS teams in total defense entering the game, allowed Oklahoma just 85 yards in the first half. Of those yards, 67 were on the Sooners’ only scoring drive. For the game, the Texas defense recorded six sacks and eight tackles for loss.

“We didn’t take Texas lightly because looking at the film, we saw that it was a quality team that was just a few plays from a couple more wins,” Oklahoma center Ty Darlington said. “They were more physical than we were today up front. We didn’t execute the way we needed to.”

Texas added a 27-yard field goal from Nick Rose on its first possession of the third quarter. Oklahoma responded with its best drive of the game, marching 87 yards in eight plays capped by Mayfield’s 2-yard touchdown pass to Dimitri Flowers.

The Longhorns reestablished their two-touchdown cushion on a 2-yard touchdown pass from Swoopes to tight end Caleb Bluiett three plays after Foreman scampered 81 yards to the Oklahoma 10-yard line.

But the Sooners refused to back down, marching 75 yards in 15 plays to running back Samaje Perine’s 1-yard scoring plunge with 8:00 to play.

Oklahoma had one more chance to tie the game but the Longhorns came up big on defense again, sacking Mayfield for a 17-yard loss on third down to force a punt with under four minutes remaining. Texas converted two huge first downs on the final drive to run out the clock and begin the epic postgame celebration.

 

1. How important was this win for the Longhorns?

Compare the win to a swimmer getting his first gulp of air after staying underwater too long — it doesn’t predict anything but it’s a great first step.

“We’re so talented — it’s just a matter of putting it all together,” Strong said. “I’m proud of our coaching staff putting together this plan. Today was our day and that’s the team. That performance today, that’s what we expect [from our players] each and every week.”

One win, even one that served as a 180-degree turnaround from a 50-7 loss to TCU, does not make a season. That being said, beating the Sooners has sent Texas in the right direction, making the second half of the 2015 season much more compelling to watch.

“These guys believe that they’re good,” Strong said. “I know they don’t always show it — they don’t always play like they do — but they have confidence. One thing they’re not missing is confidence.”

After the game, the players celebrated the moment by lifting Strong off the ground and crowd-surfing him above their heads. Any thoughts about whether Strong has lost this team were dispelled with one huge show of emotion and support for the Longhorns’ beleaguered leader.

 

2. What was the most important decision for the Oklahoma game?

Texas’ plan was to rush three down linemen and bring the blitz to confuse Mayfield while putting a stranglehold on the Sooners’ vaunted running game.

The plan worked to a T.

Perine, who set a single game record with 427 rushing yards against Kansas in 2014, was held to just 36 yards on 10 carries. The Sooners, overall, earned 67 yards on the ground on 37 carries. That’s 1.8 yards per carry against a Texas team that had allowed an average of 4.4 yards per tote coming into the contest.

“Their pressure got to us all day, whether if they were blitzing or not,” Stoops said. “We weren’t able to run the football effectively. So all in all, Texas kicked us.”

Strong said the Longhorns blitzed on almost every play and fought on every snap — a complete reversal from the loss a week earlier at TCU.

“It was a different mindset,” he said. “All week long we talked about how we were going to pressure. We had played three downs of base defense the whole game. We wanted to get the ball out of the quarterback’s hands, force him to make bad decisions and stop the run, because every pressure was set up to stop the run.”

 

3. What was the game’s biggest play?

In a game where every snap is magnified, Foreman’s 81-yard run on an old-school sprint draw near the end of the third quarter was, by far, the biggest play of the game. The play changed the game’s momentum in Texas’ favor.

Foreman was successful with the sprint draw against TCU, racking up 112 yards in a losing cause. Oklahoma knew Texas would use the play again.

“We had control defensively but that all went away with the sprint draw — that sprint draw just broke us,” Stoops said. “We defended it well but all it takes is one time. That’s what mattered.”

Foreman has made that play into a home-run threat every time it’s called.

“OU had us backed up but D’Onta broke out of there,” Strong said. “It’s hard to tackle him. The first guy is not going to get him down. He’s going to make them miss and run through them.”

Foreman and Johnathan Gray combined for 193 yards on 29 carries and will be a formidable duo for the Longhorns going forward.

 

4. Who were the game’s unsung heroes?

That award goes to the Texas wide receivers and tight ends, which made a huge impact despite catching just nine combined passes for 55 yards.

Downfield blocking is the key to a successful running game. Johnson, Lorenzo Joe and Andrew Beck sprung Heard and the running backs for sustained runs — notably the runs that gained additional yardage against the second and third levels of defense.

Strong cited Joe and his constant work ethic as an example of the team’s willingness to work hard.

“You can always count on [Joe] as he’s always going to do the little things,” Strong said. “He may not be the fastest guy, but when you ask him to block, he’ll block. Whenever he needs to catch the ball, he’ll catch the ball.

“He brings so much energy,” Strong continued. “He’s always positive and upbeat.”

 

5. What’s next for the Longhorns?

Texas gets a much-needed open date Saturday before facing Kansas State. The Wildcats lost to No. 2 TCU on Oct.10 and will face Oklahoma at home prior to playing the Longhorns on Oct. 24 in Austin.

“The guys deserve some rest,” Strong said. “They’ll take some days off and later in the week we’ll prepare for Kansas State. [The players] are beat up. They need a rest.”

In the next two weeks, Texas will look to build on the positives gained in the win against Oklahoma — a victory that could be looked back on as the one that turned the Longhorns around for good.

“A lot of things have been said about our program,” Strong said. “We knew what we had. We stayed in-house and continued to build on each other … reel each other in. We knew we had to get it done and we got it done.

“The win [against Oklahoma] is big and we needed it,” he added. “Now we have to go play the six more games we have on the schedule.”

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