Wanting your children to grow up to be … Sooners

Sporting News, The, August 19, 1996 by Stan Dorsey

Seated at a long wooden table adorned with a shiny Sooners helmet and silver microphone, Blake seems a bit uncomfortable. It is the inaugural Big 12 media day, and he struggles to answer reporters' questions with much more than cliches and vague responses--"We've got to get after it" ... "It's a long season--anything can happen" ... "Wins and losses aren't everything" ... and so on.

Except when he talks about his players.

Suddenly, his eyes light up. He recites with detail every physical and personal accomplishment he has seen them make since his arrival in Norman. He speaks of love and commitment. He stumbles over his words with excitement. It's as if he knows the joy that comes with the territory--as if he is one of them. And maybe that is just what the Oklahoma players need to escape their dark, selfpitying past.