Iowa State, Texas and the five most dangerous games on the schedule for Oklahoma in 2020

you brought up a really good point here with the four games in a row that are going to test not just rattler but this entire ou team the most on their schedule with kansas state texas christian iowa state and texas all being played right within the first five weeks of the season if i have that correct i've got to look this up yeah are you oh you okay it's got so they got a break between texas and ecu they'll have the why we stay so i i put two they have tcu and texas tech on the road that's right okay so i put tcu in front of okay what i woke up to this morning and because i'm a college football junkie and i'm a sports nerd i subscribe to a number of newsletters that i read religiously just because the way that we're able to do this job is not just the reporting but by reading as much as we possibly can to formulate our own opinions and analysis but team rankings has been pretty good about predicting right them along with bill conley and his sp have been really great and the newsletter i got this morning predicts oklahoma going eight and two with losses to iowa state and texas and i wondered like okay what is it about iowa state because i've said that that's a trap game but it's been a trap game because of how oklahoma specifically has played iowa state the last three years i mean you take the loss in 2017 right to a really good matt campbell team that's got a quarterback that had no business throwing for over 300 yards and charlie kemp doing exactly that then the next year they they basically take hakeem butler and abuse you with him but okay and then in 2019 they had their best offensive year since 2002 they put up over 400 points for the first time since 2002 in a season and then there's brock purdy who ascended he took the he took the leap right he had took the jump as we say thrown for 3 982 yards just 18 yards shy of the 4 thousand yard passing season in addition to yo man he made the wrong read on the two point conversion play because if he throws to another tight end and not the one he threw to we're not talking about parnell motley breaking it up and turning it into you know it's not a pick because two-point conversion but we're talking about iowa state beating oklahoma in norman a la the 2018 season where oklahoma state nearly beat oklahoma and norman on a failed what would have been game-winning play in the end zone so of these four games kansas state iowa state texas and texas christian are you the most terrified of iowa state or is it one of those other three teams for me it would be iowa state off the job because i think to say that texas is the biggest threat it's kind of a crutch take in my opinion throw everything out when it comes to that football game right but for me my take has been okay you mentioned some of the ups and downs when it comes to facing the iowa state cyclone but i mean when you really look at it and they lost to kempt at home they they struggled with zeb nolan running the offense for iowa state back in ames and then obviously purdy was right there but he was on the road and this was still fairly young my take has been okay you're going on the road to ames for the first time in a while and last time that oklahoma did it was not pretty you are seeing brock purdy in his first upperclassman season with some incredible talent around him i mean bruce hall tariq milton charlie collard the look goes on and on like this guy has weapons he's more comfortable he's seasoned a little bit and i think the defense for iowa state coming back also has some guys i mean jaquan bailey is always very underrated he's back greg eisworth i think is back as well so bottom line here iowa state is getting oklahoma just three weeks at home with a young quarterback over there and they're probably going to be facing oklahoma and feel that suspension window so not only is oklahoma going to be missing obviously kennedy brooks or some of those other guys who have left the program like phoebe lamb kenneth murray whatever but they're also going to be facing oklahoma potentially without ronnie perkins lamont cruise stevenson cage and bridges guys who figure to play some pivotal roles on this squad if that is the case especially if iowa state is able to allow more fans at that point in the year i would probably smash the upset but i mean i think i was taking a great position to capitalize on some early miscues by the sooners because let's be honest i mean this is a younger squad and i think we've both had to take that okay there's a chance for some real parody here in the big 12 conference and maybe that's the first domino that falls when oklahoma travels to ames iowa i'm not telling you right now hey the cyclones are going to absolutely get oklahoma because i want to see what the two can put together on the field but for me i would be absolutely the most conservative iowa state at home with their extremely talented quarterback heading into his upperclassmen season with some talent around him facing an oklahoma team that may be down a few men and still learning its identity i think it's a fascinating storyline to follow and to be quite honest with you even if iowa state doesn't get them i mean that's an absolute gauntlet because then you got texas right after that obviously week tcu and texas tech on the i don't sleep on that as well because i mean if they get alan bowman back healthy bowman had ou on the ropes last time the sooners traveled to lubbock so iowa state could either absolutely upset the sooners in that position or they could at least trigger a little bit of scare moving forward the rest of the seat i'm going to pick texas christian right because texas like you said it's it's an easy pick it'll probably be a pick that's made by dudes that don't actually talk about the big 12 very much and don't actually know much about the big 12 which is fine and if we're talking about teams that are on the way up you can look at everybody but kansas and west virginia and make a pick and and make a really great argument for how that team could beat oklahoma even as lincoln riley's got five rings on one hand for the last five years that said i look at texas christian and i see trevor murray i see garrett wallow marcel brooks is in practice if not cleared to play or getting the the waiver to play and it seems like only these quarterbacks are getting these waivers to play and then you know about jd spielman you've been very high on that as a dude that they got they got tay barber and they got zach evans back there and that game is in eamon g carter like that game's in fort worth now we'll see what the fan turnout is like but being able to not have to travel or i should say not having to travel is a big deal even if you are texas christian and i just love gary patterson's defense like i just love how they deploy that third safety i just love that they can get after people with four down linemen and they always give oklahoma a problem like jalen hurts is a heisman finalist and was second in the boating last year with 3 800 yards through the air and nearly 1300 on the ground and he played the worst game against texas christian at home based entirely on the looks that they were able to present to him and how good they were at getting past his offensive line which was a finalist for the joe moore award i i think that iowa state just doesn't have enough talent even as you name checked a bunch of dudes that i feel like have been playing there for 10 years like greg eisworth and jaquan bailey right and mike rose i mean good god but also you know bruce hall is gonna be a great tale back in this league if he hasn't already supplanted himself as that dude and i like john haycock's defense but like outside of charlie kolar he's your only superstar on that team he's he's an all-american right pre-season all-american court in the ap all i know is texas christian continues to put dudes in front of us that get drafted in the first round they pretend continue to over recruit these dudes that i should say under are under recruited by others and one of the things that it was put i was put on game with and i hadn't thought enough about this texas christian identifies talent that is under trained and undernourished because you'll remember lj collier coming out of west texas his best offer before texas christian was texas tech and i think they wanted to play like the offensive side of the ball gary patterson looked at him and said he's a defensive end and he put on 40 pounds and he got faster and he got in front of a training table and he could go ross blacklock comes back from injury he's a you know day two pick we had not talked word one really well about jalen rhaegar and he's off the board in the first round you know and we continue to look at the cornerbacks that he puts out guys like nico collins and trevor murray and even jason verit back in the day those dudes could play so i'm circling the texas christian game especially if oklahoma is undefeated because then they'll be feeling pretty good about themselves and rattler might not know what it means to be this good this early so that's the one that i would be paying the most attention to