Stoops on record pace

In this day and age of coaches hopping from job to job, Bob Stoops is a throwback.

He's been at OU a fast ten years..He just won his 100th game....

That means he's on pace to become OU's winningest coach if he stays JUST six more years. And he'd barely be 54 years old (a frisky 54, no doubt). I know time flies by the older you get...but to be sitting here talking about Stoops doing that is flaberghasting.

Saying no to big offers, sustaining championship caliber teams year after year...and for there to be a discussion about the possibility of surpassing the two legendary coaches of Soooner lore is hard to fathom. These guys aren't exactly chopped liver.

At this pace Stoops, would pass Bud Wilkinson in 20-14....and pass Barry Switzer in 20-15.

Three things to consider as you look six years down the road: First, Stoops loves the uniqueness of having a strong and supportive president...and the AD who hired him and supports him more than he could have ever imagined.

How long are David Boren and Joe Castiglione be around and how important is that?

Second, no one should ASSUME 10 wins a year for 16 seasons--not in LA, not in Norman.

Bud won only three games in 1960 and 5 in '61. And after winning the Big 8 his first 8 years, Coach Switzer then "dipped" to seasons of 7, 8, and 8 wins, before winning the next four conference championships.

So winning ten is not a given. Third is this thing about winning national championships. Legends win ‘em.  Of course those other two fellers guys won three each. True, that 2000 national championship whipped the Sooner Nation into a frenzy. It was the most unexpected and perhaps most enjoyable title of the seven.

But the "What have you done for me lately" mindset kicks in around here about every five or six years. The folks are ready for another one. Or two.  They've clearly been spoiled and don't understand you've gotta be terrific (especially with SC a perennial power) and be lucky. No other way to get there in the 21^st century. No more of the good ole' days when the powers sign the best 80 every year so no one else will have them and stockpile the talent that's so good that your third team would come in second in the conference, behind only your first team.

It's harder than ever to raise the crystal. Right now, you've got four league teams in the Top 10, a virtual Texas toss-up year in year out (yes, I know the OU dominance in the Stoops/Mack days but reality says not calling it a toss-up is unrealistic...plus it takes some steam away from my point!), a Big 12 Championship game against a Top 5 team and then three or four stout teams from La La land to Columbus to Gainesville, to Athens, to who knows where.

No, lots of fans have unrealistic expectations. They just don't understand.  But Bob, you did it to yourself by getting to a hundred so fast. And would you want it any other way? I didn't think so.  

PS. The national title game is in Miami. Been there done that. But gotta get there first. About as good of a start as anyone could imagine....but the docket has 8 more appointments on it. Then one in Kansas City if things go well. Then if things go well there.....yikes! USC looms. For what it's worth, if this team got that far it would be prepared, keep the NFL agents and lackies away, and not say uncle in the second quarter.