2 Oklahoma Sooners legends named Greatest Players of All-Time from their home state

Two Sooners legends named the greatest player from their home state of all time.

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Sean Merriman and RJ Young of Fox Sports ranked the greatest college football players from all 50 states. It was the state they were from, not necessarily the state they played their collegiate football. Two Oklahoma Sooners legends made appearances on the list, as Sam Bradford of Oklahoma and Billy Sims of Missouri represent the Crimson and Cream.

The case for Sam Bradford:

Coming out of Putnam City North High in Oklahoma City, Bradford could have played hockey, basketball and golf on scholarship. But he chose football. And he chose football knowing that a five-star prospect in quarterback Rhett Bomar and two other quarterbacks — Keith Nichol and Joey Halzle — were on the depth chart ahead of him when he spurned the likes of Texas A&M and others to commit to OU’s 2006 class. As a redshirt freshman in 2007, Bradford won the starting QB job, vindicating Bob Stoops’ faith in him. In 2008, Bradford took OU to its first (and most recent) appearance in a national title game since the 2004 season and became just the third Heisman Trophy winner from the state (Jason White in 2003, Steve Owens in 1969).

Bradford ranks third in Sooners history in all-time passing yards. From 2007-2009, the Oklahoma City native tossed for 8,403 yards and 88 touchdowns. However, he’s remembered most for his 08′ campaign. As mentioned, Bradford won the Heisman that year and was the last quarterback to bring the Sooners all the way back to a national title game.

Bradford’s 4,720-yard single-season passing record still stands in Norman (although Landry Jones fell just two yards shy of breaking it), and he became the fifth Sooner in program history to win the Heisman. His single-season touchdown record (50)also remains unchallenged in the Oklahoma record books.

Of course, he’s remembered primarily for his college career. Still, Bradford did carve out an injury-riddled career in the NFL. He accrued more than 130 million dollars between the St. Louis Rams, Philadelphia Eagles, Minnesota Vikings, and Arizona Cardinals before exiting the league as fellow Sooners’ quarterback and Heisman Trophy winner Kyler Murray was drafted to the Cardinals.

Several Sooners could make a case to be considered the greatest player to come out of the state of Oklahoma. In particular, Hall of Famer Lee Roy Selmon, who along with his brothers, formed one of the best defensive fronts in college football in the 1970s.

Turning to the state of Missouri, Billy Sims is the easy selection, though Kellen Moore Sr. would make a strong argument as well.

The case for Billy Sims:

Born and raised in St. Louis, Sims attended the University of Oklahoma, where he started for the Sooners from 1975 to 1979. He was a two-time All-American in his junior and senior year and was the recipient of the 1978 Heisman Trophy. Sims, who rushed for 1,762 yards on 231 carries during his Heisman season, became only the sixth junior in NCAA history to win college football’s most prestigious award. He was the runner-up in his senior year after totaling 1,506 rushing yards and 22 touchdowns.

Sims may not be from Oklahoma, but he’s certainly a legend there now. As mentioned by Merriman and Young, the running back ran roughshod over college football from 1978-1979, stockpiling 3268 rush yards and 44 touchdowns.

Sims was the third Sooner to take home the Heisman and is second in Oklahoma history in four statistical categories. Most notably, the running back generated 53 rushing TDs over his five-year college career.

Sims was drafted to the Detroit Lines in 1980, where he spent his entire career and made three pro bowls from 1983-1985. The former NFL Rookie of the Year ran his way into 42 touchdowns and over 5100 rushing yards per Pro Football Reference before a tragic turf accident (behind a paywall) ended his career.

Billy Sims still runs to this day, just not on the football field. The Sooner turned Lion is now a barbeque titan with over 50 restaurants across seven states.

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2021 Oklahoma Sooners Football Schedule: Downloadable Wallpaper

Never miss a game this season with our downloadable 2021 Oklahoma Sooners football schedule for your smartphone.

Never miss a game this season with our College Wire downloadable 2021 Oklahoma Sooners football schedule. Use as wallpaper for your lock screen on your smartphone.

Also, share it with friends and let them have the schedule with them at all times too!

Download the 2021 Oklahoma Sooners football schedule here

Oklahoma Sooners 2021 Football Schedule

Oklahoma Sooners 2021 football schedule

The Oklahoma Sooners are set to embark on what could be a run at their first national championship in 21 seasons. Hoping to capture their seventh straight Big 12 Championship, the Sooners will be returning one of the most explosive offenses in college football led by Lincoln Riley and Spencer Rattler.

Finally, Lincoln Riley has a defense he can feel comfortable with heading into the season. Alex Grinch’s squad is looking to be a unit that can win this team games by taking the ball away and giving it back to the high-powered offense.

The 50th anniversary of the “Game of the Century” highlights the non-conference schedule as part of Fox’s Big Noon Saturday kickoff show. Games against Iowa State and Kansas State offer opportunities for redemption and the Sooners must navigate their way through the annual minefield that is the Red River Rivalry.

Some game times and broadcast information are still to be determined. Times are listed in the central time zone.

Week	Date	Opponent	Time
1	9/4	at Tulane Green Wave (ABC)	11 a.m.
2	9/11	vs. Western Carolina Catamounts	TBA
3	9/18	vs Nebraska Cornhuskers (FOX)	11 a.m.
4	9/25	vs. West Virginia Mountaineers	TBA
5	10/2	at Kansas State Wildcats	TBA
6	10/9	vs. Texas Longhorns in Dallas, TX	TBA
7	10/16	vs. Texas Christian Horned Frogs	TBA
8	10/23	at. Kansas Jayhawks	TBA
9	10/30	vs. Texas Tech Red Raiders	TBA
10	11/6	BYE WEEK	TBA
11	11/13	at Baylor Bears	TBA
12	11/20	vs. Iowa State Cyclones	TBA
13	11/27	at Oklahoma State Cowboys	TBA

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Four takeaways from Oklahoma’s 2021 football schedule

With the 2021 Oklahoma Sooners football schedule being released on Thursday, Sooners Wire gives you four takeaways.

We finally received the news we have been waiting for since the Cotton Bowl concluded. The Oklahoma Sooners announced the full schedule for the 2021 college football season. It wasn’t much in terms of anticipation on who they were playing, we knew the who and the where. On Thursday afternoon, the Sooners announced the when.

On Sept. 4 Oklahoma will head to the state of Louisiana to play the Tulane Green Wave, which will be followed by two home games before the start of Big 12 play. In the final tune-up game of the season, Oklahoma will host an old rival the Nebraska Cornhuskers.

In their third-straight home game of the year, the West Virginia Mountaineers come to town to open conference play. These two teams did not meet in 2020 due to positive COVID-19 tests on the Mountaineers’ side. This is a good first test as they had a really good defense last season. In their last four games, the OU offense has scored 50+ points. Does the high power offense prevail or will West Virginia find a way to slow them down?

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Sooners Wire provides four early takeaways from the schedule, starting with an old rivalry.

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Oklahoma Football Schedule 2021, Analysis, Best & Worst Case Scenario

Oklahoma Sooners 2021 football schedule, analysis, and best and worst case scenarios.

Oklahoma Sooners 2021 football schedule, analysis, and best and worst case scenarios.

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Oklahoma Sooners Football Schedule 2021

– 2021 Big 12 Football Schedule

Sept. 4 at Tulane

Sept. 11 Western Carolina

Sept. 18 Nebraska

Sept. 25 West Virginia

Oct. 2 at Kansas State

Oct. 9 Texas (in Dallas)

Oct. 16 TCU

Oct. 23 at Kansas

Oct. 30 Texas Tech

Nov. 6 OPEN DATE

Nov. 13 at Baylor

Nov. 20 Iowa State

Nov. 27 at Oklahoma

Oklahoma Football Schedule Analysis: It’s going to be a fun start, but nothing all that bad that can’t be handled with relative ease. Beating Tulane and Western Carolina have to be easy, and the fun of Nebraska coming to town could go away fast if the former Big 8/Big 12 rival remains as mediocre as it’s been over the last several years.

There’s only one game in Norman, though, over the first four Big 12 games – that’s a bit misleading. The Texas game is obviously in Dallas, and the last road date is at Kansas. Two of the last four games are on the road, too, but there’s a week off in there, Iowa State is a home game, and OU only leaves the great state of Oklahoma once after October 23rd.

Oklahoma Football Schedule Best Case Scenario: The Sooners rip though this thing without breathing all that hard.

Of course that’s not how this is going to work, but there isn’t a problem with the non-conference schedule, the Sooners take care of Texas, and they roll through Iowa State and Oklahoma State in the final two games on the way to yet another Big 12 Championship appearance.

Oklahoma Football Schedule Worst Case Scenario: Something goes wrong with a brain-cramp loss at Kansas State, and the College Football Playoff dreams go bye-bye early for the second year in a row with a loss to Texas.

There’s another loss or two along the way to not only miss out on the CFP, but dropping a few games – like against Iowa State, at Oklahoma State, or to TCU – make it the rare year without going to the Big 12 title game.

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