Yup, Stoops has decided to lift the ban he imposed this preseason and will give full access to those media members and Oklahoma football fans who want to watch Saturday when the Sooners stage their final scrimmage.

Actually, fourth-ranked OU opens the 2008 season Saturday against Tennessee- Chattanooga. But the 6:10 p.m. contest at Memorial Stadium is such a mismatch on paper that it has become the punch line for jokes about the top secret tactics Stoops implemented during fall camp.

Stoops and his players did their best during Tuesday’s press conference to put on serious game faces. They recalled how the “Big House” at Michigan turned into an outhouse for the Wolverines in last season’s opener when Appalachian State pulled off one of the monumental upsets in college football history.

After all, the Sooners noted, Appalachian State and Chattanooga are both I-AA programs. Oh, and they also are fellow members of the Southern Conference.

Asked if his staff will remind the players of the Appalachian State-Michigan fiasco, Stoops acknowledged that “we already have. But there always are (big upset) cases like that.”

Uh, pardon me, coach, but that Chattanooga choo-choo that will chug into Memorial Stadium this weekend may run on the same line as Appalachian State. But Chattanooga is the caboose on this track, and Appalachian State is an engine full of national championship steam.

While Appalachian State was winning its third straight Division I-AA national title in 2007, a 2-9 Chattanooga team recorded its ninth losing season in the past 10 years.

Appalachian State will open the 2008 season Saturday by attempting to produce an encore performance of its giant-killer role when it plays at defending BCS national champion Louisiana State.

Appalachian State’s 34-32 win a year ago at fifth-ranked Michigan demands that the Tigers (and the rest of us) take the Mountaineers seriously.

But, seriously, Chattanooga has no shot against the Sooners, the highest ranked Division I-A team the Mocs have played in 57 years. Chattanooga, which is picked to finish seventh in the Southern Conference, already has lost starters at center and running back during fall camp and had eight other starters miss practice time with injuries.

The mismatch is the result of another team from Tennessee backing out on OU. Athletic director Joe Castiglione had to scramble to find an opening-game opponent when Division I-A Middle Tennessee reneged at the last minute on an agreement to play the Sooners.

While talk of the Appalachian State Mountaineers dominated yesterday’s press conference, no one came right out and mentioned another team with that nickname.

Instead of mentioning West Virginia by name, the Sooners alluded to what that band of Mountaineers did to them last January.

It is that embarrassing 48-28 loss to West Virginia in the Fiesta Bowl that will motivate OU this Saturday and for the next four months as the Sooners chase the school’s eighth national title.

“We still have a bad taste in our mouth from that last game,” said defensive tackle Cory Bennett of OU’s fourth BCS bowl loss in the past five seasons. “All summer, we’ve lived with knowing we didn’t get the job done, and that we’re labeled as people who can’t finish.

“It’s something that just burns inside you. You want to go out there and prove everybody wrong.”

Owen Field will be a proving ground Saturday for an OU team that has a lot of questions it must answer in order to get another shot at a BCS Bowl.

The Sooners have enough offensive firepower to score on anybody. But one of the reasons Stoops reportedly decided to conduct a media- free and fan-unfriendly preseason camp was because the Sooners continued their spring practice struggles with installation of the no huddle scheme.

Asked if he has decided how much he will employ the no-huddle attack, Stoops said, “We have, but I don’t care to broadcast it.”

See, there is one big reason to show up Saturday. Another is to check out a defense that is as stout as a case of Red Bull up front, but loaded with uncertainty at linebacker and in the secondary.

At the three linebacker spots, OU will start a former free safety (Keenan Clayton), an injury-plagued junior (Ryan Reynolds) and a player (Mike Balogun) who was out of the game and working in construction just two years ago.

“Everybody thinks we (linebackers) might be the weakest line of the defense,” said Clayton, who will start at strongside linebacker. “But Saturday’s only a few days away, and we can prove them (critics) wrong.

“Our goals are to get to the Big 12 championship game and hopefully the national championship. We can’t do that if we come out and mess around the first game and get a loss.”

Nope, they can’t. It might resemble a glorified scrimmage, but this one isn’t a joke. It counts.