Bedlam gains a little more ground on OU-Texas
Published: 3/21/2012 12:11 AM
Last Modified: 3/21/2012 7:07 PM
Interesting take from Ivan Maisel, the ESPN.com columnist who blogged about Mike Gundy’s new sweetheart deal at Oklahoma State and how it affects Bedlam:
“It makes me hope more than ever that Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops stays in Norman. Given Gundy's reverence for his alma mater in Stillwater, and given the way he has taken the resources provided him by sugar daddy T. Boone Pickens and turned the Cowboys into a national presence, the longer Stoops sticks around, Bedlam may catch up to the Iron Bowl and Ohio State-Michigan just yet.”
OU-OSU may catch up to the Iron Bowl and Ohio-State Michigan just yet. Not OU-Texas.
OU-OSU.
I maintain that the Red River Rivalry is a bigger deal than Bedlam. Football, and the distinction of the Texas State Fair/Cotton Bowl setting, makes it so. There are too many years of too much drama to ignore. There’s nothing like it, with the exception of the Iron Bowl and Ohio State-Michigan.
Still, there is also no denying Bedlam’s momentum. It has always had a statewide allure. Now, it’s gaining national steam, Maisel’s mention providing the latest bit of proof.
OU-OSU doesn’t have the Cotton Bowl or the fair or the appeal that makes it must-see-TV no matter how the two teams are doing at the time.
It does, however, have a few things going for it that OU-Texas does not.
It has the calendar.
You must win Bedlam to get where you want to be in January. That is by and large the case down in the Cotton Bowl, but not a hard fact. The Sooners and Longhorns walk out of that stadium knowing they have seven weeks left to grind out. The loser still has time to repair what’s broken.
Lose Bedlam right after Thanksgiving? Your season is as dead as the turkey you just devoured.
It has that fresh air scent.
For that, we can thank Gundy and the older gentleman we’ll get to in a sec. And those crazy Cowboys uniforms. And all those Cowboy players you suddenly see drafted in the NFL first round.
Not to suggest that OU-Texas has gotten stale. But OSU’s emergence has sent a charge through Bedlam we haven’t seen since Les Miles was still around, eating Bullet’s grass.
Most of all, it has the sugar daddy.
For a very long time the closest thing we had to a college sports owner was Phil Knight at Oregon. Then Pickens started making it rain on Lewis Field, and suddenly Knight looked like the grandpa who sends you a $5 bill for your birthday.
Now Pickens is the closest thing we have in college sports to Jerry Jones. He loves letting you know he’s pouring millions into OSU athletics almost as much as he loves spending the millions in the first place. Where there’s a camera, he’ll be there.
That makes him among the most passionate boosters to ever sign a check, and God love him for that. Flaunt it you got it. Right?
Even OU fans were hip to that… Until Pickens’ money helped rocket OSU right past the Sooners during the 2011 football season. The Cowboys buried OU in Stillwater, buried some old demons in the process, and played the varsity BCS bowl in Arizona a few days after the Sooners’ JV cameo in Tempe.
That didn’t just draw OU fans’ attention, it drew their anger, their resentment.
For years, as I understood it, Sooner backers never cared much for OSU. But they saved their hostility for Texas. Again, it was always a football thing. It made more sense to insult Bevo than Pistol Pete.
Well, it’s still a football thing. And guess who became a bigger pain in OU’s backside than Texas last year?
Not saying one season makes a new archrival. But it won’t take many more like it.
-- Guerin Emig
Written by
Guerin Emig
Sports Writer
