AP Poll Released: OU Ranked No. 4

    As the Oklahoma football team prepares for their opening game against Louisiana Tech on August 30, ESPN has released the associated press’ top 25 for this season. OU is ranked fourth in the nation behind Florida State, Alabama, and Oregon, and has one of the easiest schedules out of all of the top 4 teams. Although most Oklahoma fans expect their team to be in the inaugural playoff grouping this season, the numbers from last season, the returning talent, and the unbiased truth behind Trevor Knight, state otherwise, and OU fans will, once again, label the season as a “disappointment”.
    National media has ridden the high off of OU’s victory in the Sugar Bowl over Alabama since the game ended, and Trevor Knight played his most impressive game of the 2013-2014 season right along with his performance against Kansas State. For this, Oklahoma fans will pay the price of having to stand and watch as their team doesn’t live up to expectations for what has seemed like the ultimate headline for OU since their National Championship win against Florida State in 2000. Let’s not act like OU hasn’t been a contender in the last 14 years, but have they shown up in any of their bowl games since last year? Not really. Are we going to count the wins they have had over the last 5 seasons before this most recent Alabama win? The former wins include the Insight Bowl (now the Buffalo Wild Wings Bowl) win over Iowa in 2011, a season where Iowa was anything but impressive, the laughable Fiesta Bowl in the 2010-2011 season where OU had the privelege of going up against a run-first Uconn team that has been known to be anything but a football school…ever, but what about the 2009 Sun Bowl against Stanford? Wasn’t Andrew Luck, the current Indianapolis Colts second-year quarterback, on that team with one of the best college running backs in the last 5 years, Toby Gerhart? Nope. Luck wasn’t.  Before that win against the Cardinal, you have to time-travel back to 2005 in order to find an Oklahoma bowl win, and that was against an Oregon team who was using their back-up quarterback. Sure, it may seem like OU has been the toast of the town when it comes to providing a regular season performance that is anything short of spectacular, but when it came time to show the entire country who was the best, OU hasn’t been in the victor’s circle since the 1999-2000 season. To give you some perspective, I was 6 years old at the time. So what does OU’s past have to do with the current team that is heading into this upcoming season?
    Expectations are through the roof for this year’s squad, it all starts with the defense, and the linebacking core already has taken a huge hit due to the fact last year’s leading tackler, Frank Shannon, is suspended the entire season. On offense, it all starts with Trevor Knight. People have so much faith in this young man, and believe it or not, it won’t be enough to put Oklahoma on top of the college football world. Knight was the starter heading into the 2012-2013 season, and was promptly replaced by, now tight end, Blake Bell, after a few games. From that point on, the OU quarterback situation was a huge conglomerate of indecision on a weekly basis, and even got to the point where people were asking for the third-string QB, Kendall Thompson (now transferred). How can OU fans and national media be so high and mighty over Trevor Knight? Sure, he showed us how capable he is and the potential he possesses, but due to the inconsistency of his play throughout the season, who is to say that he has gotten any better? Bob Stoops and the coaching staff rave about how good he looks in practice, but didn’t they say that last year as well? In honor of Allen Iverson and his beliefs, “We be talkin about practice! Not a game…Practice.” Here’s a bold prediction: Baker Mayfield, former Texas Tech quarterback and now current OU walk-on who is awaiting the ruling in his eligibility case this week, if eligible for this season, will take over for Trevor Knight at once point this season due to Knight’s poor play or injury, and will lead Oklahoma to, what I believe, will be a 10-2 season.
    Now, a 10-2 season might just be enough to win the Big 12 championship and get into that playoff picture, but if the losses come where I think they will, we are looking at team that will be looking from the outside, in. Tennessee is a game that worries me only because it’s the SEC and it’s a game that takes place early on on in the season where teams are still trying to work some kinks out. The other game is against Baylor, a team that destroyed OU last season in Waco. But don’t overlook Bedlam against Oklahoma State and the Red River Rivalry game, against Texas, down in the Cotton Bowl, either. The potential for this team to completely drop out of the Top 25 is there, but it will take some major choke jobs to get to 8-4 and just be…ok.
    In conclusion, the season outlook for OU is bright, but the success will cling to the inconsistent shoulders of Trevor Knight because no one will count Oklahoma out of going undefeated if Knight takes off where he left off in the Sugar Bowl. But if he struggles and OU loses some games they weren’t predicted to, then expect to hear about it from the fans and media. Just something to think about, as the Sooners are presented with success on a so-called, “silver platter”