There was enough magic and enough Baker Mayfield to get around it through most of the year, but it eventually cost them a shot at a championship. If the storyline of a first-year head coach learning how to finish football games sounds familiar to Sooner fans, it’s because they went through the same thing in 1999 with Bob Stoops.
Last year Lincoln Riley put together one of the best first seasons of any coach in college football history. He set the Sooners’ program win record with 12 victories in his inaugural campaign and had Oklahoma heartbreakingly close to playing for a national championship game.