It's alive

Sporting News, The, Oct 21, 1996

John Blake warned everyone. He told us, "The giant is waking up right now and will continue to shake until we rise."

But it was hard to take him seriously, considering his troops were still looking for their first victory at the time. Among the early-season embarrassments were losses to Texas Christian. Tulsa and San Diego State. The nadir was two weeks ago, when Kansas invaded Norman and pasted the Sooners, 52-24. It was the most points Oklahoma had allowed at home, and it was not the send-off to the Texas game that Blake had in mind. The Sooner Nation began thinking about the unthinkable: a winless season.

But then the giant was roused.

"This win is really unexplainable," Blake said after a 30-27 overtime triumph over the Longhorns at the Cotton Bowl. "All I could think about was all that we went through. There is a lot of hard work behind closed doors that doesn't always show on the scoreboard."

Throughout his team's 0-4 start, Blake had preached that his young team was improving but needed to stop making the kinds of mistakes that resulted in big plays by opponents. In the blowout loss to Kansas, the Sooners were penalized 16 times and gave up three special teams touchdowns.

There were still breakdowns Saturday--the Sooners had two punts blocked and committed a crucial holding penalty--but, led by halfback James Allen, Oklahoma finally made enough plays to win

"We overcame and ended up winning," quarterback Justin Fuente said. "W e finally get over the hump."

For a long time, the Sooners were on top of the college football hump. But what went wrong since the Sooners won their last national title under. Barry Switzer in 1985 has been well-chronicled.

Scandal rocked the program in the late 1980s and Oklahoma ultimately was socked with three years of NCAA probation. Switzer left after the '88 season, replaced by a dour but saintly former Sooner, Gary Gibbs, who did everything right other than going a combined 4-16-1 against Texas, Colorado and Nebraska.

Gibbs gave way last year to a rare outsider, Howard Schnellenberger, the Yosemite Sam-voiced relic who once led Miami and Louisville to acclaim. Schnellenberger was a windbag of false bravado who, according to insiders, berated everyone in the administrative offices. His wife insisted everyone refer to her as "Mrs. Schnellenberger."

That might have been tolerable had Oklahoma won eight or nine games. But after the Sooners finished 5-5-1, the team's worst record since going 3-7 in 1965, Mr. and Mrs. Schnellenberger were shown the door.

The school then hired, on Switzer's arm-twisting recommendation Blake, a true-blue former Sooner player who was a line coach on Switzer's Dallas Cowboys staff. At 35, Blake is the youngest Division I-A head coach in the country and the youngest on his staff. He inherited a freshman-sophomore laden team with nine returning starters, none on the offensive line, and an erratic sophomore quarterback in Eric Moore, whom Blake has benched in favor of Fuente.

Some say the Oklahoma swoon is scandal residual, though insiders claim the fault has been in recruiting. Oklahoma is losing in-state players, which once would have been unfathomable, and hasn't had an All American since lineman Anthony Phillips in 1988.

Blake, who had no previous head coaching experience, is responsible for evoking memories of home-grown Heisman winners (Steve Owens and Billy Vessels) and keeping Oklahomans at home.

"Tradition is always going to be here," Blake says. "But what made the Sooners were the people that played on the football field. You don't step on the field and become part of tradition."

Blake will need time to turn recruiting around, and word is he will get it done. He helped his cause last Saturday. The victory over Texas left Blake in tears as he hugged players, coaches and friends.

"I want to enjoy this victory with my players, my coaches, the people who stood beside us and the fans," he said. "We've got kids who need to see some success from all the hard work. They can see the rewards they can receive when they work hard and believe in each other."

Lean on John

One of the first things Ron Dickerson did after keeping his job at Temple was have a heart-to-heart talk with Owls basketball coaching legend John Chaney. There aren't two more different people than Chaney and Dickerson, yet they have the utmost respect for each other. The voluble, volatile Chaney told Dickerson to stop trying to carry the whole burden of losing.

"I told him, `Ron, don't beat up on yourself. Beat up on your players,'" Chaney says. "He needs to beat the crap out of the coaches who coach defense.... There isn't a better guy that I know of than Ron Dickerson. Knute Rockne couldn't do what Ron has done."

Dickerson's five-year contract expires after the 1997 season. He has quietly asked athletic director Dave O'Brien for an extension. O'Brien, who became A.D. this year, hasn't made any commitment.