Monday Morning Quarterback: Sooners' Season Opener

The Oklahoma Sooners are set to open their season Saturday against the Utah State Aggies.

Thursday, May 26th 2011, 11:55 am

By: News On 6

Monday Morning Quarterback: Sooners' Season Opener

Originally Published: Aug 30, 2010 12:56 AM CDT

Dean Blevins
Oklahoma Sports Sports Director - Oklahoma City

OKLAHOMA CITY -- OU opens it 2010 season Saturday evening at a 31-point favorite to beat Utah State. Look for Oklahoma to come out of the chute with a good dose of enthusiasm, despite playing the weakest of the four teams they’ll meet in non-conference action.

Both teams will enter Owen Field juiced up---relieved that the nasty conditioning in the winter, spring, summer and fall is finally over and that it’s time to play a real game. That’s reason alone to jump up and down, something they and their jousting partners will be doing a lot of—before kickoff.

The pregame rah rah/jumping up and down reminds me of what Barry Switzer used to call it when outmanned opponents would do all the whoopin’ and hollerin’ before kickoff. He’d called it “false chatter”—“don’t listen to that boys, that’s nothing but a bunch of false chatter.” That was his way of describing their fake show of confidence that would depart their bodies the first time Lee Roy Selmon hit ‘em in the mouth.

Switzer would say that the best thing about the false chatter was that the other team knew it was fake. Didn’t meant a thing. Just junior high rah-rah stuff. False enthusiasm. “False chatter,”

He always said it was even better when THEY knew that WE knew it was false chatter. Better yet when THEY knew that WE knew that THEY knew that the chatter was false. And fake doesn’t work in football.

A LITTLE ABOUT THE AGGIES

Utah State's 2010 season seems to have some good, bad, and OU hopes some ugly. The good is that second year head coach Gary Anderson should see another jump forward. And starting senior QB Diondre Borel has gotten bigger and is coming off what some in Logan are calling a “breakout season.”.
The bad new is that star running back Robert Turbin suffered a torn ACL and is out for the season. And dependable receiver Stanley Morrison will is out after a freak diving-board accident at a pool left him with a potentially career-ending foot injury.

The second bad is more long-term. The Aggies are apparently being left behind as the Western Athletic Conference breaks up, leaving them uncertain about what to do next and where to do it.